With an engineer like Adrian Newey, he’s one of the guys, it’s rare.
This car, we had it in an area where it responded to the most minute changes, and you know you’re in a sweet spot. I’ve had a chassis dialed in pretty close, right in a sweet spot, at Indy before, but nothing like this one, for some reason. MA: It’s usually the package, but primarily at Indy, you need an engine, no question. Q: Was it the chassis or engine that was so superior in this car, or was it all of it? It didn’t bring me home, but it was not the fault of the car. I think I was almost two laps in the lead and just cruising home. We dropped a valve with about 23 laps to go. I was always using the top gear, giving it the least amount of revs, because the engine guys were always screaming, “Keep the revs down, keep the revs down!” and little did I know that with lower revs, like 600 revs lower, I was running in the bad harmonics of the engine. You use a lower gear when you have a full load of fuel, and then top gear so you don’t over-rev it. I had led every lap, except for during the stops, throughout the race. That’s why I dropped out of so many races. MA: In all my years, I was always chastised for being too hard on the cars. Quite honestly, what beat me was I was too easy on the engine. And I’ve never had a car that remained neutral throughout the race. We changed the front springs only by 50 pounds. It’s the only time ever that just before, maybe 10 minutes before the start, we were on the grid and on pole, and we changed the front springs because we had the car so dialed in, track temperatures and all that. It’s a very rare feel that you could have before the race. It’s one of the times when I really felt at the beginning of the race a ‘today, they’ve got to beat me’ kind of thing. We even won the pit stop competition, which doesn’t have anything to do with the car, but we were on a roll. The bottom line is if you look back, I think I was quickest pretty much every day I was on track.
When I look back, it didn’t hurt that I had probably one of the best or the best engineer that ever lived so far, Adrian Newey, with me on that car. Mario Andretti: Looking at the whole picture, it was my ’87 Lola, no question. Q: What was your favorite car you drove in the Indianapolis 500? Read other installments of "My Favorite Car" here. “My Favorite Car” interviews will appear on IMS.com on Mondays through the spring. Note: This is the first of a series of interviews with Indianapolis 500 legends about the favorite car they drove in “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing” and why, in their words. Febru| By Paul Kelly, Indianapolis Motor Speedway
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