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Sports See other Sports Articles Title: Hornish Jr nips Marco Andretti for Indy victory Hornish Jr nips Marco Andretti for Indy victory Date 2006-05-28 (Speedway, IN) By Nancy Knapp Schilke - >http://Motorsport.com Sam Hornish, Jr. had the final say at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in the 90th running of the Indianapolis 500. The one thing missing in Hornish's career was drinking the milk at the Brickyard at the end of 200 laps. Today, that dream came true when he nipped Marco Andretti at the finish line by 0.0635-seconds to land his 15th career Indy Racing League IndyCar Series win. "I can't put it into words exactly want it means to me, but it's the best day that I'll ever have as far as my career goes," commented the race winner. "It's a great feeling, I wouldn't trade it for anything else. They (Team Penske) did a heck of a job. It may not always go the way you want it to, but it makes it a lot sweeter this way." Victory for Team Penske is usually a strategic exercise execute according to plan. However, today the plan went out the window but the ending was the same: Victory! "Every one of them is exciting," said Penske on his 14th Indianapolis 500 win. "I think you're so emotional. All of a sudden you wake up, we won the race. I can tell you one thing, with 50 to go, I thought we were going to go home and close our tent." As one of the early leaders, along with teammate Helio Castroneves and the two Chip Ganassi Racing drivers Dan Wheldon and Scott Dixon, Hornish who was the fastest man all month at the Speedway was one of the favorites. AGR's Tony Kanaan took the lead on lap 183 as the Brazilian was always in the hunt from the green flag to the final laps. Wheldon and Kanaan traded the lead three times when Kanaan made the move followed by the two of them making a sandwhich out of a lap car with Wheldon having the edge and then Kanaan grabbed it back -- all this in a small space of time on the same lap! Hornish did not have a smooth race which is what caused Team Penske to toss out their game plan when on lap 150 when he came in for a pit stop under a caution and started to exit with the fuel hose still attached. Not only did it cost the team a scary moment but it cost time when Hornish stopped as he was leaving the pit box with the nozzle still attached to the car. Per IndyCar rules, Hornish had to re-enter pitlane for a drive-thru penalty once the field returned to green flag racing. Townsend Bell who had the same type of incident in his Vision Racing pits had to serve the 60mph penalty also. To add to Hornish's dilemma, Bell came in to fast and lightly tapped Hornish on the pit road. "I told him to stop. I told him to go, go," admitted Penske. "I tell him stop. I told him to go. I thought it got stuck. Of course, when you see him coming out, you're trying to time it because we wanted to see if we could beat those guys out. It was completely my fault." It appeared that the hopes of Hornish would be dashed and with Castroneves out earlier in the race due to contact with Buddy Rice, Team Penske's return to victory lane appeared to be a longshot. And the two Ganassi racers appeared to have the edge as they had for the better part of the race already. Yet, odds were given to Kanaan as he had been running up in the top of the leaderboard with consistent lap times. When the final caution came out on lap 190 which opened the door to the second-closest finish at "The Greatest Spectacle of Racing", the face of the race had a dramatic change when the field took the final re-start of the day and only four laps remained. When the green flag waved, Michael Andretti held the lead followed by his 19-year-old son Marco. Scott Dixon laid third with Hornish fourth, Kanaan fifth, Dan Wheldon in sixth followed by Dario Franchitti and Danica Patrick. Complicating things further for the Team Penske driver was Bryan Herta, who was in the mix and down by 12 laps. The first move was made by the rookie when he made a run on his dad and became the youngest driver to lead the Indy 500. And when the young man passed his dad, that move was reminiscent of Mario Andretti's pass over Michael in 1992; however that day Michael took back the lead. Today, he could only watch his son from back in third holding his breath and hoping that the Andretti luck had Indy would change. It did not. "I knew I had a shot at this race, and that's what you want," said Marco. I know I have a lot of shots lift, but you to learn from my dad's career that you have to take advantage of every one of them." The first challenge to the rookie race leader came on the penultimate lap when Hornish made a move in Turn 3 that Andretti blocked. Thinking he probably would not have another chance, Hornish still did not admit defeat as the duo came out of the final turn on the final lap. "To be completely honest, I thought I did it with one lap to go. But I don't know where that speed came from," commented Marco on Hornish's move to the front. "I think I could have put a pretty decent block on him, but that's a very risky thing to do." Hornish kept the pedal down, had his Team Penske Honda-powered Dallara in the right gear and sailed toward the start/finish line with a pass on Marco Andretti that stuck as the two raced to the checkered flag. "I love it, nothing better right now," Hornish said when he took his first sip of the milk in victory circle. "I thought that it was over when I didn't get him (Marco) going down into (turn) 3 there. But we dug down, put her back in there and took off," Hornish said. "He (Marco) had a heck of a ride," Hornish said. "So no matter what happened, he should be very proud of that." Michael Andretti who climbed back into the cockpit just for this race played three roles during the month of May: Team owner, driver and father. As a racer, he again saw heartbreak in the Andretti camp when his son just missed the victory. Michael Andretti finished third. As an owner, his cars finished 2nd, 3rd, 5th, 7th and 20th. "I have to say congrats to him (Hornish)," remarked Marco. "It's tough for me to do, but they were fast all month. But woulda, shoulda, coulda. Second place is nothing here." Marco was disappointed in the outcome, but truly this remarkable rookie proved without a doubt that even though he was still in his teens, his talent and his maturity was that of a experienced veteran racer. Not once did the young Andretti lay a wheel down wrong while traveling at an average over 218 plus miles per hour lap-after-lap (the five cautions did slow the race average speed). His dad was proud of his son and realized that Marco had the faster car of the two when the kid made the move to take the lead plus he had his own mirrors filled with Hornish and Wheldon. Once Hornish sped by, Michael kept the 2005 Indy 500 winner at bay. "We almost did (win). I knew I didn't have the speed, and saw Marco got a run on me and I figured I would get over, block him a little bit, but then I saw he had such a run that I was going to give him the line and figured I would try to protect him and unfortunately, I didn't do a good enough job," reflected Michael. "Hornish got by me a little too quick, and that was it. But it was a fairy tale, it was the dream that we talked about." Wheldon came across in fourth followed by Kanaan and Dixon. Franchitti, Patrick, Scott Sharp and Vitor Meira rounded out the top ten.
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