He Retakes Lead From Rookie Patrick With 7 Laps Left
By Tarik El-Bashir
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, May 30, 2005
INDIANAPOLIS, May 29 -- Ten laps remained in the Indianapolis 500 when Danica Patrick passed race leader Dan Wheldon. Earlier Sunday, Patrick had become the first woman to lead the race -- now she had her sights set on winning it.
More than 300,000 fans stood and screamed, sensing they were only 25 miles from witnessing history.
But Patrick's fuel-starved racecar began to slow slightly, and Wheldon retook the lead on Lap 194 of 200. He held on to win a race that will be remembered at least as much for the woman who didn't win as the man who did.
Patrick, a 23-year-old rookie, wound up fourth, the best finish for a woman. (The previous best was Janet Guthrie's ninth-place finish in 1978.) Patrick had dialed back her car's fuel consumption -- which costs horsepower -- in the final laps to make sure she had enough to finish.
"If I could have run full fuel, we'll never know," Patrick said. "I'd like to think we could have won it."
Instead, after a race that featured 27 lead changes -- the second most in its history -- Wheldon collected his fourth victory in five Indy Racing League races this season. The win gave team owner Michael Andretti what he had come so close to as a driver but was never quite able to pull off: a trip to Victory Lane at the Brickyard and the obligatory sip from the milk jug.
"No more curse," said Andretti, whose family had been plagued by bad luck here since his father, Mario, won the race in 1969. "This place had been tough on me personally. But I just always had the feeling that one day I would have some good memories here."
Vitor Meira, Patrick's Rahal Letterman teammate, finished second and Bryan Herta was third. Wheldon, who started 16th, took the checkered flag under caution after Sebastien Bourdais smacked the outside retaining wall with two laps remaining.
"I'm certainly satisfied in the fact that I've won the Indianapolis 500 in my career," an emotional Wheldon said. "I mean, it's a kid coming from England. You know what the race is like watching it on TV and reading about it magazines.
"And then I came over and watched Kenny Brack win [in 1999]. It just opened my eyes to the magnitude of the event and how much I wanted to be here."
Despite the performance of the 26-year-old from Emberton, England, Patrick (who started fourth) was the story before, during and after the race.
Her runs during qualifying and practice had indicated that she had the car and the talent to win the race. She backed it up on Sunday, becoming the first woman to lead the 500 on Lap 57. (She led three times for a total of 19 laps.) But she stalled her engine in the pits on Lap 79 and fell back to 16th.
The drama for Patrick was only beginning. She worked her way back up to eighth, then made a rookie mistake: She spun under caution on Lap 155 and smacked into fellow rookie Tomas Enge, destroying her front wing and bringing out the yellow flag.
Patrick ducked her Panoz-Honda into the pits for a new wing and managed to stay on the lead lap. She came in again four laps later, still under caution, and took on a full tank of fuel. She came out of the pits in 11th place.
But when the leaders pitted on Lap 172, Patrick stayed out, giving her the lead again. Patrick's team owner, Bobby Rahal, gambled that his driver had enough fuel to finish. And she did -- but only by the slightest margin.
Wheldon, in a Dallara-Honda, passed Patrick on Lap 186 before the caution flag came out again. When racing resumed on Lap 190, Patrick zipped past Wheldon, much to the approval of the roaring crowd.
"Wow, what a day for me," Patrick said. "A stall in the pits and a spin and then I was leading the race at the end. We really had to dial back the fuel just to make it to the end. So I was just trying to hang on as long as possible."
But she wasn't able to hold off Wheldon with seven laps left, not with a car that was running on fumes.
"Unfortunately, you're a sitting duck when you start restarts in the lead here," Wheldon said of Patrick's pass with 10 to go. "I knew I could pass her, but it was just a matter of timing. And having done it once, she was obviously aware of where I was good and where I was not. So she made it a little bit more difficult."
Meantime, the heartbreak continued at Indianapolis Motor Speedway for Penske driver Sam Hornish Jr. The 2001 and 2002 IRL series champion led the most laps (77) but crashed out of the race on Lap 147. Hornish was uninjured.
Bruno Junqueira, another early challenger, had moved up to sixth when he got tangled with a lapped car on Lap 78. Junqueira suffered a concussion and two back fractures, which will require surgery.
The weekend's feel-good story, Brack, was forced to retire because of a suspension failure on Lap 99. Brack was making his first IndyCar start since nearly being killed in a horrific racing accident at Texas Motor Speedway 19 months ago.
Asked afterward if her performance had proven a point for women, Patrick said: "I made a hell of point for anybody, are you kidding me? I came from the back twice. It was frustrating to be leading the race with so few laps remaining and not be able to finish hard and just hang out up front and win the thing. But I also knew something had to give."