Photo Credit: Chris Owens/IndyCar
Josef Newgarden, driver of the No.21 Preferred Freezer Chevrolet, finished third in the 100th Running of the Indianapolis 500 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Newgarden was frustrated after the race ended because he had a good car, a car that could have won the race.
“Yeah, I mean, it’s really heartbreaking, to be honest,” Newgarden said. “The reason is because I think we had a car to win. I’m not saying we should have won the race definitely because we had the best car, I just think we had a car that could have won. What I wanted was an opportunity to try to race those guys at the end. We didn’t get that. That’s no fault to my guys. I think that’s just how the race fell. Sometimes it doesn’t fall your way. Today was a day it didn’t fall our way.
“Congratulations to Rossi and Honda. It’s a huge achievement to win around here. I just wish we had an opportunity to race those guys straight up at the end. I really think we would have had something for them if we could have gone flat out there at the end and tried to beat them straight up.
“Just proud to be here, though. Shoot, just having an opportunity to be here with as good of a car as I did, not many people experience that. Today was something new to me. Thank you to my team, Ed Carpenter Racing, all our partners, Preferred Freezer Services, Direct Supply, Fuzzy’s Vodka. We’ve had amazing sponsorship and support within our team.
“They’re the people that enable us to do this. I think JR had just as good as a car. Ed would have been there, too, if he didn’t have an issue. Tough day. Man, I was really feeling it at the end. If we get a race going, we’re going to be good, we’re going to be able to beat these guys. The way the fuel played out, we didn’t have an opportunity to do that.”
Newgarden says his main priority as the laps were winding down was to stay up front. He also said he was going flat out balls to the wall and just winging it, to get all the speed he could out of the car.
“I thought we had to trim this thing to win it, “Newgarden said. “We had a lot of downforce at the beginning. We tried to trim and trim and trim. My sole focus was, Let’s get to the last three, five laps and be up front, then I’ll do whatever I got to do at the end to win the thing. That kind of sounds silly. Well, didn’t you have a plan? Weren’t you thinking of a plan the whole race? I was. I was sticking to my priority of, Let’s get this car up front, the keep it there for the last five laps. When we’re up there, we’re going to have a great shot at winning the thing.
“Really you can’t predict what’s going to happen at the end of the race. I could see how Carlos was, I could see where he was good, where he was bad. I think he had a little bit more straight speed than us, which was going to be difficult to overcome. I was going to wing it on those last three to five laps and kind of feel out what I had to do to try to beat him, if he was the guy I had to actually race at the end. I had a priority, like I said. I just wanted that opportunity. Didn’t really come for me.”
This year the speeds of the cars going around the famous oval of IMS were topping the charts. Sometimes they would hit 240 or higher. Media as well as the fans were saying that no driver should be going 240 into a corner like they were.
“You should,” Newgarden added. “You do. You’re scheming every stint, trying to figure out what guys are doing, where they’re good, where they’re bad. You’re definitely processing that information and trying to formulate a plan.
“I just didn’t think I had to have a definite plan for those last laps. I didn’t think I had to lead here or there. It was like, we’re going to see how it starts to fall. I think the safest thing was to lead the thing and be up front. I would have devised a plan there in the last couple laps and tried to make it happen.”
Some people wonder after seeing drivers get some emotional during interviews and at other times after a race is over but how they end up concealing their emotions while in the cockpit.
“You know, I personally try not to big it up,” Newgarden added. “This race is so easy to be overwhelmed with. You get on the parade laps, you see all the people that were here, it was nuts here today. It’s always cool when you do the parade laps, see the people, how many there are. But today was another level.
“I think for me, I try and not think of that. Hey, this is just another race. Let’s see what we can do. I try not to put a lot of pressure on it. There at the end, I could feel we had an opportunity to win. I didn’t get too excited. It was just, Let’s keep working on the task at hand. Like any other race, let’s try to get the car up front. What do we need to do, what do we need to do at the end to have good wing angles.
“Let’s have a good last pit stop and try and win this thing. That’s what I was doing. When I came out of the pits, Carlos was way out on me, he gained a lot of time. I was thinking the same thing, It’s not over, I’m going to keep sucking up on him with the draft. There were a couple lap cars that were kind of helping me. I was go, go, go, till the very last stint with the checkered flag.
“I think the biggest thing is not bigging the race up. It’s a huge deal. This is the one race in your life you want to win. You can’t think about that. You have to think about it as another race and just try and focus on the task.”
This may have been the 100th running of the Indianapolis 500, however the original owner Carl Fisher, decided to build the Indianapolis Motor Speedway 107 years ago. A lot of people wonder what he would thing of all the changes made to the historic track since that time.
“Well, I would hope he would have been damn impressed by what we put on,” Newgarden stated. “The race has evolved. You can’t get away that time has changed the way this race happens, the way it plays out for those 200 laps. I think the thrills around this place have not gone down. I mean, if you told me the thrills went down with that race, I think you’re crazy. You’re not into racing then.
“This place is all about courage, innovation, passion. I think providing a great spectacle for America. It’s one of our icons for sporting events, I believe. It’s probably the largest crowd you’ll ever see gathered together in one setting for one day. So I think they’d be proud that we still have cars running this race, providing bits of information and innovation for the industry of motors and motor vehicles, trying to push the boundaries of performance and safety.
“That’s really what it’s all about. It’s all about drivers putting courage and everything on the line, pushing the boundaries of safety and performance of your vehicle. I really don’t think that’s changed as far as the core values of what it is. I think he’d be proud of the amazing race. I think you’ve seen the response by the fans, with everyone that came out, they still supported just as much today.”
