Spain’s motor racing fans will be gripped to their seats today as Fernando Alonso runs out in the famous Indy 500 motor race
Motor racing fans across Spain and the rest of the world will be gripped to their seats tonight as Spaniard and legend Fernando Alonso makes his third attempt to win the famous and most dangerous motor race of them all, the Indianapolis 500.
Alonso, who wishes to add the prestigious motor race of them all, that sees speeds up to 250 miles an hour around the famous oval circuit known as the “brickyard” is making his third attempt.
His first attempt as a rookie saw him run well and was pushing for the lead when he suffered engine failure in the second half of the race, whilst last year due to a bodged car by Mclaren saw him fail to qualify.
Today, Alonso will start from 26th on the grid, although in final practice he was running in the top 10 speeds.
The circuit that takes crash victims straight to the wall, and takes no prisoners, runs over 2.5-mile laps with 4 high-speed turns as the race lasts for 500 miles.
Nobody has ever won the race from as far back as 26th but Indy is the place where anything can happen and Alonso fans know their hero from Spain can win it despite the starting grid position.
” Grid position means nothing at Indy really,” said former Nigel Mansell lugnut, Dave Travis who ran the race twice with Mansell twice in 92,93 “It’s all about getting hooked up well at the start and staying on the pace for the first half of the race and staying out of trouble,” he told Global247news.
“Anything can happen at any time, take 93 for example, we were on for a win, Nigel had it in the bag, but out came a yellow for debris on the track with just a few laps to go, on the restart he simply missed a gear, end of sport”
” 94, again we were on it until a rookie landed on his head coming out the pit lane, you have to be be prepared for anything to happen at the Brickyard,” he said
” I feel Fernando, who I have worked with over the years in F1 can pull this off, I spoke with him last night and he’s very confident, he has the pace up and he says the car is hooked up well to run for the race, pit stop strategy and refuelling tactics could play a major part as always, it should be a great race,” said Travis.
The race starts at 7.30 PM in Spain as the nation will be willing on their driving legend in their thousands.
Pole Sitter Marco Andretti, is though attempting to bring the title home for the Andretti family for the first time since Mario Andretti took the title in 1969 despite many family attempts thereafter.
It’s the 104th running of the prestigious 500-mile race and this year but the normal 500,000 crowds, that makes it the most spectated sporting event in the world, will be missing making it the first time running with no crowd due to the coronavirus pandemic and it’s also the first time the cars will run with protective windscreens.
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