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Takuma Sato surprise winner of wreck-filled Indy 500

 
Scott Dixon’s car goes over the top of Jay Howard, soaring so high that Helio Castroneves drove under it while it was airborne. Stunningly, there were no serious injuries.
Scott Dixon’s car goes over the top of Jay Howard, soaring so high that Helio Castroneves drove under it while it was airborne. Stunningly, there were no serious injuries.
Published May 29, 2017

INDIANAPOLIS — Takuma Sato, a journeyman driver, became the first Japanese winner of the Indianapolis 500 on Sunday when he held off three-time champion Helio Castroneves in a 230-mph wheel-rubbing duel to the finish.

"Unbelievable!" Sato shouted after holding off Castroneves by 3 car lengths. Ed Jones was just behind them in third.

"I really thought we had it," said Castroneves, who was trying to join A.J. Foyt, Al Unser and Rick Mears as a four-time winner. "I think I bent the throttle, I pressed it so hard. I know I bumped Sato's car a few times. That thing must be indestructible."

Castroneves was lucky to be alive, much less battling for victory at the end. He actually drove under the airborne car of Scott Dixon, whose race ended in a crash that is likely to live forever in Indy lore. It was the most spectacular of several collisions, which all but transformed the competition into a wheel-to-wheel destruction derby without serious injury to anyone.

Sato, 40, a failed Formula One driver who had just one previous victory in 123 IndyCar starts, led for 17 of the 200 laps.

"I knew I was racing against a real champion," Sato said of the duel with Castroneves through the final laps. "When he came up beside me with three laps to go to take the lead from me, I decided this was my moment, to win or lose the race."

Despite his lofty fourth-place starting position in the 33-car field, Sato was perhaps the least-heralded member of his team, the six drivers for the Honda-powered Andretti Autosport. Team owner Michael Andretti, whose cars have won five 500s since 2005, said Sato's tenacity was the reason he had hired him this season.

"The guy just never gives up," Andretti said. "There's no quit in him. But those last laps were heart-stopping to watch. I didn't know if he could pull it off."

Andretti's star driver, two-time Formula One champion Fernando Alonso, a rookie at Indy, had his engine expire with less than 50 miles to go. He was the leader for 27 laps.

"Who knows what position we could have been in, if that had not happened?" Alonso said. He was knocking on the door of the top five when the engine seized.

The race was briefly stopped about a quarter of the way in after the death-defying crash involving Dixon, the top qualifier. Jay Howard's car had bounced off the outside wall, and as it ricocheted across the track, it collected the trailing machine of Dixon.

Dixon's car was launched high into the air, and it seemed to float until it landed broadside on the inside guardrail. The car lost its engine and rear wheel assembly in the first big impact, and then almost everything but the driver's safety capsule before it stopped tumbling.

There were no immediate signs of injury, but Dixon, the 2008 Indy winner and a four-time IndyCar champion, returned to the care center later complaining of a sore ankle. He was fitted with a boot.

A few laps after the race restarted, there was another scary-looking accident, involving Conor Daly and Jack Harvey. Another yellow caution flag was waved when Marco Andretti's car lost a wing section.

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"Hopefully, the crowd enjoyed it," Sato said of the race. "It's beautiful. I dreamed of something like this since I was 12."

Bourdais attends

St. Petersburg resident Sebastien Bourdais was at the race, eight days after a practice crash that left him with a fractures to his pelvis, hip and two ribs. Bourdais, using crutches to get around, nearly fell stepping onto a dais because he couldn't put weight on his right leg. "It's great to be out of the hospitalized environment,'' he said. "It's great to feel about normal, to be able to walk around and see some familiar faces. If you give me a load of painkillers, I can do a lot.''