Álex Palou is close to victory in the 500 miles of Indianapolis that the legendary Helio Castroneves takes

He stayed very close, but the Spanish Alex Palou he will have to settle for telling that he was second in his second Indianapolis 500, which is not little. Until the last meters he was fighting with the legendary Helio castroneves, who at 46 achieved his fourth victory in the legendary ‘brickyard’.

It was a much quieter edition of the 500 miles than usual. In fact, for the first time in history, only one driver had left in the middle of the test, a Stefan Wilson who hit the wall when entering the pits. The difficulty to control cars that are unbalanced on one side.

By the time that equator was reached, Palou (who started 6th) already knew what it was like to lead, as he did so in 78 due to the pit stops.

But then he did it in a real way and with total merit on the track. It was in 119, when he got into a fight with Castroneves after a car accident. Graham rahal, who came out of the pits with a badly fitted wheel that led to a very long yellow flag.

This factor was key for the Brazilian and the Spanish, together with the Mexican Duck O’Ward, which was also the leader for a few laps. In the final stretch, it was up to Castroneves (whose Indy debut was in 1998, a year after Palou was born) and the Spaniard. The fight between the two was at the limit, with the last 20 critical laps … but he did not have time.

Palou was leading a good part of the race. It seemed that he was going to be able to, but an overtaking of Castroneves with two laps to go and the management of the doubled gave him a small advantage. A yellow flag before or an incident, very common in this test, and perhaps we would be talking about the first Spanish to win the Indianapolis 500.

In view of 135,000 viewers (40% of the capacity of the sports venue with the largest capacity in the world), the Brazilian added his fourth Borg Warner trophy, after those achieved in 2001, 2002 and 2009. It equals the mythical Rick Mears, AJ Foyt Y Al Unser as the most victorious drivers in the history of the 500 miles. He had to sweat a lot to beat a Palou who is leading the IndyCar championship standings after this race.