Rossi, who started eleventh, was competitive throughout the racing, frequently featuring towards the top of the scoring pylon. While the race was primarily dominated by Helio Castroneves, Josef Newgarden, and Tony Kanaan, Rossi was consistently in the picture. After a late-race caution for Takuma Sato’s clout with the Turn 4 wall, the strategy game went into full effect. The field hit the pit lane with 36 laps remaining, and considering past history, it was a good bet that there would be a late-race yellow flag to allow the leaders to pit once more for a final pit stop. With 32 laps the average length of a fuel stint, it seemed certain that everyone would need to pit for fuel.
Kanaan, Newgarden, and JR Hildebrand waged an exciting duel at the front over the last 30 laps, with Hildebrand having inherited the lead by virtue of not making a pit stop with the rest of the field during the Sato yellow flag. The predominant strategy for the leaders was to go hard with the hope for a yellow or a certain splash of fuel before the checkered flag fell. Rossi, who restarted the race in ninth after the final caution period, was one of three drivers who tried to make it to the end without stopping.
Carlos Munoz made a hard charge to the front during the final stint, taking the lead and battling with Newgarden after Hildebrand and Kanaan made slightly earlier pit stops. Munoz and Newgarden swapped the lead back and forth until first Newgarden and then Munoz made their final stops. With those two out of the way, Rossi cycled to the lead with two laps remaining. Rossi put on a painstaking display of fuel saving over the final two laps, having inherited a lead of half a lap over Munoz.
That effort was worth it, though, as Rossi coasted across the famous yard of bricks in first, taking victory in his first attempt at the Indy 500. Rossi’s last lap was 179.784 mph, 40 mph slower than runner-up Munoz’s last lap. In an interesting statistic, despite his painfully slow last two laps, Rossi did set the fastest lap of the race on Lap 106, a 225.288 mph lap. Rossi was the only driver to post a lap of 225 mph over the course of the 200 laps.
Munoz was bitterly disappointed to claim a runner-up finish for the second time and was visibly upset immediately after the race. Newgarden came home third, ahead of Kanaan and Charlie Kimball. Hildebrand, polesitter James Hinchcliffe, Scott Dixon, Sebastien Bourdais, and Will Power completed the top ten. Both Kimball and Power used the same strategy as Rossi over the final stint, but only Rossi was able to convert that into a victory.
Just a year ago, Rossi was the polesitter in the GP2 Series race on the glamorous streets of Monte Carlo. Later that year, he was a Formula 1 driver for Marussia. Dropped by the team, he made the move to the Verizon IndyCar Series this offseason, hooking up with Herta and Andretti for a full season of racing in the United States. Now, Rossi goes down in history as the rookie winner of the 100th Running of the Indianapolis 500 Mile Race.
IMS
