Danica Patrick Regains Ground in Indy 500, Narrowly Misses Crash of the Year
Danica Patrick, wearing Pino, Black, G12 lens, has endured a rough year so far and rolled into qualifying and testing at her favorite race, the Indy 500, after a miserable month of scrutiny both from the media and fans. However, she stuck to her guns and converted the energy into a strong and respectable finish at the “Grand Daddy of Them All,” with a well-driven 6th place finish. After qualifying poorly at 23rd on the grid, she drove a smart, steady and often brave 500 miles for her second top-10 finish of the season.
Driving for a crowd of over 350,000 fans in attendance for the 94th running of this speed classic, Patrick was one of a record four women in this year’s Indy 500, along with Sarah Fisher and rookies Simona De Silvestro of Switzerland and Ana Beatriz of Brazil.
“I’m very happy with the result, and the reasons we got it were that our pit stops rocked and we had a perfect strategy,” she said. “We did struggle a little bit in the early going” and “almost went a lap down” to the leaders, Patrick said. But she gradually climbed through the field. “I’m really glad that yellow [flag] came out at the end, because we were cutting it real close on fuel,” she said.
Danica also narrowly missed a spectacular last-lap crash which involved teammate Ryan Hunter-Reay. Hunter-Reay, wearing Klay, Black, G12 lens, struggled this month for speed, but found it on Race Day driving most of the race at or near fifth. Then saw his good race nearly turn into horrible nightmare as just before the finish when he ran out of gas and was subsequently clipped from behind by Mike Conway. Already driving with torn ligaments in his thumb suffered in an earlier Pit Lane incident, Hunter-Reay was nearly beheaded as Conway’s car was sent airborne.
In what is being described as one of the most spectacular crashes in Indy racing’s history, Conway’s #24 car rolled over the back tire of back wheel of Hunter-Reay’s #37 car, which served as a catapult and flung the Indy car into the air, causing a back-flip, and a slam into the high barrier, eventually landing back on the track in a heap.
Contributing to the Mike Conway crash is that his speed was at least 20 miles per hour faster than everyone else at the time. Most of the leaders were running on fumes and slowing down to conserve fuel in the final laps. Conway was gassed up and making passes left and right, once of which caught the tire of Hunter-Reay.
Both Conway and Hunter-Reay suffered injuries, but the fact that anyone walked away from the horrific crash is a miracle. Best wishes and a speedy recovery to all involved.
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