By
CNN
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Josef Newgarden used a scintillating last-lap pass to win the Indianapolis 500 on Sunday for the second consecutive year in a race that started four hours late due to extreme weather.
“I’m just so proud of the team. They crushed it. I mean, crushed it. … They came here with the fastest cars. We worked our tails off,” Newgarden told race broadcaster NBC.
The Indy 500, one of the most prestigious and highly-anticipated events of the motorsport calendar, began four hours late on Sunday afternoon after lightning and extreme weather caused organizers to pause pre-race festivities, evacuate fans from the grandstands and wait for rain to pass and the track to dry up.
The race was initially scheduled to begin at 12:45 p.m. ET but was pushed back to 4:45 p.m.
When it got underway, it was a fan’s delight, with passes at the front of the field and in the pack. There were a race-record 16 different leaders and 87 lead changes. Newgarden and Pato O’Ward battled for the win in the final laps, with Newgarden passing the Arrow McLaren driver on the last trip around the 2.5-mile circuit.
Newgarden is the sixth driver to win back-to-back races in Indianapolis and the first since Hélio Castroneves in 2002.
The win gave team owner Roger Penske 20 victories in “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing.”
The Indy 500 regularly shares a date with the famous Monaco Grand Prix, known as the “crown jewel” of the Formula One calendar. Earlier Sunday, hometown hero Charles Leclerc won the race around the streets of Monte Carlo for the first time.
NASCAR Cup points leader Kyle Larson is attempting to drive the Indy 500 and Coca-Cola 600 in the same day – a feat made more difficult due to the weather delay.
Larson raced in Indy and led some laps but finished 18th as an Indianapolis 500 rookie.
He had qualified an impressive fifth as a driver for Arrow McLaren.
After driving in the Indy 500 and doing postrace media, Larson will head to the Charlotte Motor Speedway in North Carolina in an attempt to finish two major motorsport races in the same day, though he will have to take over from another driver who will take his place for the start of the 600. The green flag for the NASCAR race came at 6 p.m. ET.
Larson, the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series champion, is attempting to become the fifth driver to start both races. John Andretti was the first to accomplish this in 1994, with Robby Gordon and Tony Stewart subsequently taking on the Double on five and two occasions respectively. It was most recently attempted by Kurt Busch in 2014.
“The Double” is regarded as one of the toughest challenges in motorsport due to the mental and physical toll of driving 1,100 miles in a single day, navigating the differences between open-wheel and stock cars and the exhausting travel schedule.
“I don’t want to be just referenced as the greatest NASCAR driver of all time or the greatest sprint car driver of all time, I want to be known as somebody who could climb into all different types of cars and be great at what they do,” Larson said in 2021, per NASCAR.
One of only four drivers to win the Indy 500 four times, Castroneves was seeking history on Sunday when he lined up at the Brickyard for the 24th time.
A win on Sunday for the Brazilian would have seen him stand alone as the only person to win the race on five occasions. At 49 years old, Castroneves was aiming to become the oldest ‘500 winner ever and does not plan to hit the brakes any time soon.
Despite high hopes, he finished in 20th place Sunday.
“(Racing at 50) was always my goal, but I don’t want to just ‘do it’,” he told Indy Star. “I feel like we’re still very competitive, and not only just to win, but to make people go crazy here, and that’s what I want to do.
“Right now, I want to keep it going, because that’s what I know best. I’m sure this will change, but I don’t think it’s going to be in the near future.”
