INDIANAPOLIS — Parity has rang king at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway lately. We’ve had nine straight years of a different driver drinking the milk. Furthermore, we’ve had 13 different winners in the last 16 years. The only repeat winners since 2003 has been Dario Franchitti and Dan Wheldon.
But, despite those stats, if you want to win Sunday’s 104th Running of the Indianapolis 500 (1 p.m. ET/NBC/INDYCAR Radio Network) you may want to be one of the 13 combined Andretti Autosport, Team Penske or Chip Ganassi Racing drivers. After all, Andretti and Ganassi have combined for five of the top nine starting spots in what is sure to be a track position race.
Ganassi, also hasn’t won since 2013 but from 2008 through 2012 they won three ‘500’s in a five year span. Scott Dixon looks the part this year in being third, first, third and third practice last week.
Penske and Andretti have combined to win each of the last six years here and 10 of the last 15. But, if you throw Ganassi into that mix, then since 2000, these three organizations have crossed the yard of bricks first in 17 of 20 tries. The only three they didn’t win was in 2013 when Tony Kanaan won with KVSH, 2011 when Dan Wheldon won with Bryan Herta Autosport before they joined Andretti and 2004 with Buddy Rice and Rahal/Letterman/Lanigan Racing.
So, while parity is high right now, it’s not as much in this race as one would think. This trio has won 83-percent (33 of 41) of the races run since the start of 2018 and 81 percent (59 of 74) since 2016.
Who would you take?
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