IndyCar: 2019 Indy 500 field the most competitive in race history

By Asher Fair | May 20, 2019

INDIANAPOLIS, IN - MAY 28: Tony Kanaan of Brazil, driver of the #10 NTT Data Honda, leads a pack of cars during the 101st Indianapolis 500 at Indianapolis Motorspeedway on May 28, 2017 in Indianapolis, Indiana. (Photo by Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images) /

The difference in speeds between the fastest and slowest qualifying IndyCar drivers for the Indy 500 has never been smaller than it is for the 103rd running of the race.

Formula E has been in the news a lot lately for its high level of parity throughout the entire 2018-2019 season. But if you’re looking for a lot of parity, look no further than IndyCar.

Team Penske’s Simon Pagenaud took the pole position for the 103rd running of the Indianapolis 500 by recording a top four-lap average speed of 229.992123 (officially rounded to 229.992) miles per hour in his #22 Chevrolet over the course of his qualifying attempt in the Fast Nine Shootout Pole Day qualifying session.

The slowest of the 33 drivers who successfully qualified for this 200-lap race around the four-turn, 2.5-mile (4.023-kilometer) Indianapolis Motor Speedway oval in Speedway, Indiana ended up being 30th place qualifier Pippa Mann of Clauson-Marshall Racing.

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Mann secured her position on the starting grid for this race in the Saturday qualifying session and did not have to re-qualify in the Last Row Bump Day qualifying session on Sunday, where the four-lap average speeds ended up being slightly higher than hers was.

Mann secured herself the 30th position on the starting grid by recording a four-lap average speed of 227.243605 (officially rounded to 227.244) miles per hour in her #39 Chevrolet. As a result, the disparity between the fastest and slowest qualifiers for this year’s running of the “Greatest Spectacle in Racing” is the smallest that it has ever been in the 103-year history of the race.

Just 2.748518 miles per hour separated Pagenaud and Mann over the course of their respective 10-mile qualifying runs. In terms of total time, Pagenaud spent 156.5271 seconds on his qualifying run while Mann spent 158.4203 seconds on hers.

So over the course of 10 miles, the slowest driver spent only 1.8932 seconds longer qualifying than the fastest driver. This shattered the previous record of 2.1509 seconds, which was set in the qualifying session for the 98th running of the race back in 2014.

In terms of physical distance, Pagenaud’s average rate of speed over his qualifying run was 4047.861361 inches per second whereas Mann’s was 3999.487439 inches per second. Over the course of a 10-mile run, that translates to him finishing just 210.328601 yards ahead of her.

While that may not seem like a small margin, that is equivalent to only 11.931818% of a mile, and these are 10-mile qualifying attempts we are talking about here, not quarter-mile sprints around a high school track.

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With this year’s Indianapolis 500 field being the most competitive field in the history of the “Greatest Spectacle in Racing”, how will the 103rd running of the race play out? Will it feature more passing a closer finish than last year’s running of IndyCar‘s most prestigious race did? Tune in to NBC at 11:00 a.m. ET on Memorial Day Sunday, May 26 for the live broadcast of the race from Indianapolis Motor Speedway to find out.