His teammate Sato, however, was still on the same strategy and hopeful of benefiting from it. “We had ’em,” a dejected Rahal said afterward. That brought out a yellow caution flag that bunched the field, jumbled the order and neutralized the best fuel strategies. But at the 300-mile mark, fuel mileage was taken somewhat out of the equation when Rahal, the fuel economy champion to that point, lost his left rear wheel after a pit stop, causing him to crash Daly clobbered the loose wheel.
#Helio castroneves indy 500 drivers#
Generally speaking, it seemed the drivers powered by Honda engines were getting better mileage than the Chevrolet runners. That would be a savings of as much as three-quarters of a lap. Thinking of the end of the race, they hoped to make one fewer fuel stop than the rabbits up front.
Veterans like the 2014 winner, Ryan Hunter-Reay Castroneves the two-time winner Takuma Sato and Graham Rahal were wisely stretching an extra lap or two, or more, out of every tank. In the next segment, the sport’s vaunted youth movement, which has turned Ind圜ar’s entrenched order on its head so far this season, established itself at the front of the field: the Indiana native Conor Daly, 29, moved to the lead ahead of VeeKay, 20, followed by O’Ward, 22, Herta, 21, and Palou, 24.ĭespite their raw speed, however, another key factor, fuel mileage, was starting to come into play. Before they could get restarted and refueled, they each lost more than a lap, knocking some prerace favorites, including the pole-winner Dixon, out of contention. Those still on the course, like the former Indianapolis 500 champions Scott Dixon, Alexander Rossi, Tony Kanaan, Pagenaud and others, were unable to make their planned pit stops - and ran out of fuel. That strategy backfired when Stefan Wilson crashed on pit road, closing it.
Half the field had made their regular stops, while the other half tried to stretch their fuel economy to the limit. The race’s first plot twist came during the initial round of pit stops, starting at Lap 30.
0 kommentar(er)
