Alex Palou wins the 109th Indianapolis 500

The NTT IndyCar Series raced the 109^th running of the Indianapolis 500 from Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Sunday afternoon. The race was delayed for over an hour due to rain. Robert Swartzman started the race on the pole with Takuma Sato starting second.

After the rain passed and the command was given to start the engines, the cars rolled out onto the track. During warmups, Scott McLaughlin was warming up his tires when he lost control of the car and crashed into the inside wall just before Turn 1.

When the race did start, the caution was back out on the first lap. Ryan Hunter-Reay drove up the track pushing Jack Harvey up, who made contact with Marco Andretti. Andretti went around and hit the Turn 1 wall. Robert Swartzman led the opening eight laps before losing the lead to Pato O’Ward on the ninth lap. O’Ward led two laps before Takuma Sato passed him for the lead on lap 11. Sato continued to lead until the caution came out again on lap 19 for conditions.

During the caution, a majority of the drivers went to pit road with some like Alexander Rossi electing to stay out. He was the new leader when the race restarted on lap 30. For the next 12 laps, Rossi and Christian Rasmussen traded the lead several times. During the green flag, Rossi’s car was leaking fluid and he went to pit road.

His car caught on fire and ended his day finishing in 31^st place. During the round of pit stops, Rinus VeeKay had no brakes and slammed into the wall on pit road bringing out the caution on lap 82. At the time of the caution, Takuma Sato was the leader.

Sato went to pit road and Ryan Hunter-Reay was the new leader. During the pit stops, pole sitter Robert Shwartzman hit a crew member and damaged the left front. He was out of the race on lap 113. A lap into the restart, Kyle Larson got loose at Turn 2 collecting Kyffin Simpson and Sting Ray Robb bringing out another caution on lap 92. Ryan Hunter-Reay continued to lead until making a pit stop on lap 102 and Devlin DeFrancesco was the new leader.

DeFrancesco, Conor Daly, David Malukas, Christian Rasmussen, and Ryan Hunter-Reay all led laps during the green flag. With 30 laps to go, Marcus Ericsson was leading the race with Alex Palou chasing him down. On lap 186, Palou passed Ericsson for the lead. He led the final 14 laps to win his first Indianapolis 500. He became the first Spaniard to win the Indy 500.

It was also his fifth win of the season in six races which has not happened since A.J. Foyt in 1979. The rest of the top five finishers were Marcus Ericsson second, David Malukas third, Pato O’Ward fourth, and Felix Rosenqvist fifth. There were 22 lead changes among 14 drivers. Takuma Sato led 51 laps, the most in the race, and there were seven cautions for 44 laps.

The NTT IndyCar Series heads to the streets of Detroit, Michigan, next Sunday for the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix at 12:30 pm on Fox. Purchase tickets for all IndyCar races today at StubHub.

Finishing Order: