1995 Indianapolis 500 Miles Sweepstakes
Rain fell the night before the race, and moisture continued throughout the early morning hours. The rain stopped, however, and the track was dried. The start of the race was delayed by only about five minutes.
At the start, Scott Goodyear swept into the lead from the outside of the front row. Seconds later, Stan Fox dipped low to the inside, hit the rumble strips, became loose and spun a half turn. The car shot directly into the outside wall in turn one. The car was demolished, the front nose was ripped off, and Fox's legs and body were exposed as the car crashed up into the catch fence. Robbie Stanley, Lyn St. James, and Willy T. Ribs were caught up in the accident.
Jeff Gordon ran over a piece of debris, breaking the front suspension. He limped back to the pits, but dropped out when it was determined the damage was too much to repair.
Tough Luck for Jeff Gordon...
A long caution was needed for cleanup, and Fox was critically injured with a closed head injury due to g-forces. Despite his exposed extremities, however, he suffered no major injuries to his arms or legs. Fox was transported to Methodist Hospital, and after several months, he recovered, but would never race again.
On lap 10, the race finally got restarted. Tony Stewart, the hotshot rookie who became an overnight sensation in his first Indycar appearance, got the jump on the green flag, and took the lead.
The rookie sensation Tony Stewart flying in the early goings
On lap 37, Stewart was trying to get by the car of Scott Sharp. the Indiana native felt that Sharp was blocking him, and as they went into turn 1, Stewart gave him the finger. In the process, he knocked off his helmet headrest cushion. It flew out of the cockpit and landed on the racing surface. It brought out the yellow flag for debris. The yellow came out during a sequence of green-flag pit stops, the field was hectically shuffling in and out of the pit area.
By rule, the pits were immediately closed at the onset of yellow, and Jacques Villeneuve became scored as the leader on lap 38. A few cars, including Villeneuve, Scott Pruett and others, had not made their scheduled pit stop yet, and were getting precariously close to running out of fuel. Villeneuve was not aware he was actually leading the pack. The pace car came out to pick up the field, and by rule, was supposed to get directly in front of Villeneuve as the leader. But Villeneuve went by the pace car twice, not knowing they were trying to pick him up. Finally, the officials sorted out the field, the pit area was opened, and Villeneuve immediately went to the pits for service. He suffered a slow stop with several errors. He nearly pulled away with the fuel hose attached, then subsequently stalled as he pulled away.
A few minutes after the race went back to green, Indycar Inc. assessed Jacques Villeneuve a two-lap penalty for passing the pace car twice as they were trying to pick him up. The penalty dropped him from 3rd place to 27th. The two laps were effectively deleted from his scoring serial.
Michael Andretti led 45 laps in the first half but on lap 77, he was abruptly knocked out of the race. Maurício Gugelmin was leading in turn four, and Andretti was behind him in second place. Andretti caught him in turn four, as Gugelmin was slowing down to make a pit stop. Andretti tried to go around him on the outside, but got up into the "marbles" and brushed the wall exiting turn four, damaging the suspension. He veered across the track to enter the pits, to have the crew look over the car. The rear wishbone suspension was bent, and Andretti climbed out of the car, out of the race.
Another didappointing race for the 2-time Indy 500 winner
As Andretti was climbing from his car, Scott Sharp spun and wrecked in turn four.
By the time the field went back to green on lap 84, Jacques Villeneuve had made up one of his laps. He was running 20th, one lap down.
On lap 124, Andre Ribeiro stalled on the track with an electrical problem. By that time, Jacques Villeneuve had gotten his lap back, and was now on the lead lap in 12th place. Villeneuve caught another break when Christian Fittipaldi, in the Budweiser Newman-Haas Lola-Ford, slowed on the backstretch with electrical problems, bringing out another caution.
Maurício Gugelmin led the most laps so far, but did not manage to lead again after lap 138. The leaders were now Jimmy Vasser, Scott Pruett, and Tony Stewart. Jacques Villeneuve was now up to 6th place. After Vasser pitted while leading on lap 157, Villeneuve retook the lead for the first time since his penalty.
On lap 162, Davy Jones crashed in turn 2 as Villeneuve was preparing to pit. The race restarted on lap 169. Vasser led following pit stops by most of the drivers during the caution. A lap later, Scott Pruett passed him going down the backstretch for the lead. Vasser got high and hit the outside wall in the north chute. Pruett held point until shortly after the restart on lap 176 when Stewart passed him.
By this stage of the race, the winds began to gust over 30 mph. On lap 184, with Stewart still in front by almost a second, Pruett got high in turn 2 and bounced off the outside wall. Pruett's car spun across the backstretch, got airborne and backed into the catchfence, demolishing the rear end.
With eleven laps to go, Tony Stewart led Jacques Villeneuve, Scott Goodyear and Ayrton Senna under caution. The Brazilian, the inly Penske that qualified, race an uncharacteristically understated race, but it ended up paying off, for he was in prime position to turn on the Honda power and deliver his magic late in the race...
The field prepared to go back to green on lap 190. Down the backstretch, Stewart held back a little bit and allowed the pace car to clear ahead. Indycar official Don Bailey was driving the Corvette pace car, which was entering turn four. At the entrance of turn three, Stewart and Villeneuve both accelerated, leaving a trail of tire marks behind. Villeneuve was right on his tail. Entering turn four, Smoke continued to accelerate, but Villeneuve suddenly backed off to avoid passing the pace car. The two cars had caught up to the pace car in the middle of turn four, and it had not yet entered the pits. Tony did not lift, blew by the pace car and proceeded to race down the front stretch. The rest of the field checked up and a gaggle of six cars nearly collided to avoid the pace car as it pulled into the pits.
flagman Duane Sweeney put out the green flag, with Stewart now well ahead of the rest of the cars. Villeneuve emerged from the melee still in second, and the rest of the field diced down the front stretch and funneled into turn one without incident.
A few moments later, race control announced that Tony Stewart was being assessed a stop-and-go penalty for passing the pace car on the restart. To say that Stewart was pissed would be a massive understatement. On his radio, he insisted that he did not do anything wrong. He claimed that the green light was on, and many felt the pace car was going too slow. The black flag was waved at Stewart but he kept racing and chose not to acknowledge it. Team owner John Menard told him to keep going to the end believing they could protest the penalty after the race. Per the black flag rules, Stewart had a window of five laps to serve the penalty before disqualification.
Since he failed to heed the penalty, Indycar Inc. ceased scoring him after lap 195. Therefore, when Jacques Villeneuve came around to complete lap 196, he was scored officially in the lead, with Ayrton Senna second and Bobby Rahal now third.
This led to a three-way drag race to the end. Ayrton Senna and Rahal turned on the power to catch up to Villeneuve, with Senna on the way to attacking the young French Canadian.
Moves were made, and blocks at the limit of legality ensued, but in the end, it would be the blue and white car of Player's Forstyhe Green racing, coming from two laps down, who crosses the finish line first and its driver, Jacques Villeneuve, who will drink the milk and boast that he defeated Senna at Indianapolis.
On the last lap, Arie Luyendyk passed Villeneuve at the stripe to un-lap himself, and finished 7th on the lead lap. With his lap total stopped at 195 for ignoring the penalty, Tony Stewart sank through the standings to 15th place, five laps down.
Scott Brayton's day ended ten laps down in 17th place. His car was down on turbocharger boost, and after the race he quipped that he was so slow he felt he "was in the way." Years later, it would be revealed that Brayton (and his teammate Scott Goodyear), were secretly being penalized for illegally over-boosting their turbocharger plenums and tampering with the pop-off valves during practice and qualifying.
Tony Stewart was visibly upset in an interview as he said to reporters: "It's Bullshit, that's what it is. I feel like I won this race. The pace car was going too slow. ... I almost hit it. Scott Pruett almost hit it, Villeneuve almost hit it. He wasn't on the gas and I saw the green lights turn on and that meant go. That's all I can say. I stayed out because in my eyes it was perfect ... and if I came in and later found I didn't make a mistake then what are you going to do? It would have been too late and you won't get it back. It's bullshit."
1) Jacques Villeneuve 20 pts
2) Ayrton Senna 16 pts
3) Bobby Rahal 14 pts
4) Scott Goodyear 12 pts
5) Robby Gordon 10 pts
6) Mauricio Gugelmin 6 pts
7) Arie Luyendyk 4 pts
8) John Andretti 3 pts
9) Buddy Lazier 2 pts
10) Hiro Matsushita 1 pt