Indianapolis 500: Pagenaud sweeps the month of May with Indy 500 win

Indianapolis 500: Pagenaud sweeps the month of May with Indy 500 win

Published on 26 May 2019 21:56

By: Fergal Walsh

Simon Pagenaud has won his first Indianapolis 500 after a close fight with Alexander Rossi in the final laps.

Pagenaud held off the 2016 winner after the swapped positions for a number of laps, overtaking each other at the first corner following a late restart.

Pagenaud made the final overtake stick with one and a half laps to go, getting around Rossi at Turn 3, and staying ahead to take the chequered flag.

It marks the second consecutive win for the Frenchman, as he took victory at the IndyCar Grand Prix two weeks ago for Team Penske.

With double points on offer for the 500 win, Pagenaud leaps to the top of the championship standings. Rossi crossed the line two-tenths of a second behind the Frenchman, while Takuma Sato was third - both he and Rossi were chasing their second 500 win.

Josef Newgarden was fourth and struggled with his car throughout the race. At each pit stop, he made front wing adjustments to improve the balance of his car.

The third Penske car of Will Power was fifth, despite having to take one of the restarts from the back of the field after he hit one of his crew members while serving his pit stop.

The first yellow of the day was thrown out when Colton Herta retired with a gearbox issue on the fifth lap.

Kyle Kaiser was the first to become a victim to the walls, as he spun and suffered terminal damage to his Juncos car, ending the fairytale story after he bumped Fernando Alonso from qualifying.

Marcus Ericsson also caused a yellow after he spun when entering the pits, damaging his front wing.

The final caution, which saw the red flag deployed, was brought out when Sebastian Bourdais and Graham Rahal came together at Turn 3, with Felix Rosenqvist, Zach Veach and Charlie Kimball also getting caught up.

The resulting restart saw the close battle between Pagenaud and Rossi, with Pagenaud coming out on top and giving Roger Penske his 18th Indy 500 win.

Pos.	Driver	Team	Time	Gap
Pos. 1.	Driver Simon Pagenaud	Team Team Penske	Time 2:50.39.2797	Gap -
Pos. 2.	Driver Alexander Rossi	Team Andretti Autosport	Time 2:50.39.4883	Gap +0.2086
Pos. 3.	Driver Takuma Sato	Team Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	Time 2:50.39.6210	Gap +0.3413
Pos. 4.	Driver Josef Newgarden	Team Team Penske	Time 2:50.40.1776	Gap +0.8979
Pos. 5.	Driver Will Power	Team Team Penske	Time 2:50.40.8970	Gap +1.6173
Pos. 6.	Driver Ed Carpenter	Team Ed Carpenter Racing	Time 2:50.41.2587	Gap +1.9790
Pos. 7.	Driver Santino Ferrucci	Team Dale Coyne Racing	Time 2:50.42.0852	Gap +2.8055
Pos. 8.	Driver Ryan Hunter-Reay	Team Andretti Autosport	Time 2:50.43.2995	Gap +4.0198
Pos. 9.	Driver Tony Kanaan	Team A.J. Foyt Enterprises	Time 2:50.44.0505	Gap +4.7708
Pos. 10.	Driver Conor Daly	Team Andretti Autosport	Time 2:50.44.6256	Gap +5.3459
Pos. 11.	Driver James Hinchcliffe	Team Arrow Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	Time 2:50.44.7618	Gap +5.4821
Pos. 12	Driver James Davison	Team Dale Coyne Racing with Byrd and Belardi	Time 2:50.45.5047	Gap +6.2250
Pos. 13.	Driver Ed Jones	Team Ed Carpenter Racing	Time 2:50.46.8297	Gap +7.5500
Pos. 14.	Driver Spencer Pigot	Team Ed Carpenter Racing	Time 2:50.47.8363	Gap +8.5566
Pos. 15.	Driver Matheus Leist	Team A.J. Foyt Enterprises	Time 2:50.49.6950	Gap +10.4153
Pos. 16.	Driver Pippa Mann	Team Clauson-Marshall Racing	Time 2:50.52.2600	Gap +12.9803
Pos. 17	Driver Scott Dixon	Team Chip Ganassi Racing	Time 2:50.54.0392	Gap +14.7595
Pos. 18.	Driver Helio Castroneves	Team Team Penske	Time 2:50.49.0031	Gap +1 Lap
Pos. 19.	Driver Sage Karam	Team Dreyer & Reinbold Racing	Time 2:50.51.5697	Gap +1 Lap
Pos. 20.	Driver J.R. Hildebrand	Team Dreyer & Reinbold Racing	Time 2:50.51.9110	Gap +1 Lap
Pos. 21.	Driver Jack Harvey	Team Meyer Shank Racing with Arrow SPM	Time 2:50.55.1235	Gap +1 Lap
Pos. 22.	Driver Oriol Servia	Team Team Stange Racing with Arrow Schmidt Peterson	Time 2:50.55.5954	Gap +1 Lap
Pos. 23.	Driver Marcus Ericsson	Team Arrow Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	Time 2:50.56.0464	Gap +2 Laps
Pos. 24.	Driver Jordan King	Team Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	Time 2:50.56.2725	Gap +2 Laps
Pos. 25.	Driver Charlie Kimball	Team Carlin	Time 2:51.01.0337	Gap +4 Laps
Pos. 26.	Driver Marco Andretti	Team Andretti Herta Autosport with Marco & Curb-Agajani	Time 2:51.05.2004	Gap +5 Laps
Pos. 27.	Driver Graham Rahal	Team Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	Time 2:21.00.8224	Gap +24 Laps
Pos. 28	Driver Felix Rosenqvist	Team Chip Ganassi Racing	Time 2:21.02.8734	Gap +24 Laps
Pos. 29.	Driver Zach Veach	Team Andretti Autosport	Time 2:21.03.1752	Gap +24 Laps
Pos. 30.	Driver Sébastien Bourdais	Team Dale Coyne Racing with Vasser-Sullivan	Time 2:21.30.4575	Gap +24 Laps
Pos. 31.	Driver Kyle Kaiser	Team Juncos Racing	Time 54:33.5858	Gap +129 Laps
Pos. 32.	Driver Ben Hanley	Team DragonSpeed	Time 45:30.1160	Gap +146 Laps
Pos. 33.	Driver Colton Herta	Team Harding Steinbrenner Racing	Time 00:05.2074	Gap +197 Laps