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Franchitti steals show

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Special to The Times

Have you seen the trailers for Ashley Judd’s latest performance? They’ve been all over TV. Terrific stuff.

She’s a race driver’s wife, running barefoot in a pouring rain down the pit lane at Indy, soaking wet, hair and dress stuck to her skin, shivering more with joy than cold -- just ecstatic.

She’s trying to get to Victory Lane to kiss her husband, who has just become the first Scotsman to win the Indianapolis 500 since Jimmy Clark in 1965, by gambling that rain would cut short the race before he ran out of fuel.

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For a while it didn’t look like Dario would make it. (Dario’s her husband, see. How a Scot got the name Dario Franchitti makes the story line even better.)

But then his brilliant young protege crashed horrifically and went upside down and caused a terrible melee, debris flying everywhere.

Awful as it was, the crash guaranteed that Dario could cruise comfortably under caution, conserving fuel. (Don’t worry, the kid wasn’t hurt, other than bruised.)

No sooner had Ashley lifted her face to the sky with gratitude than she felt the rain on it. As it began to pour, she made no effort to take cover; she removed her hat and shoes and began that barefoot sprint.

What’s that? When will this be in theaters?

Wait a minute. Nobody said Ashley Judd portrays a race driver’s wife. She is a race driver’s wife.

And the scene was fact, not fiction Sunday.

And finally, Dario Franchitti will be known as the winner of the 91st Indy 500, and not just as Ashley Judd’s husband, as he has been in the past.

The protege who crashed was Marco Andretti. (The subplot being that the saga of Andretti family heartbreak at Indy just kept on rolling, the longest-running tragedy in the history of the Brickyard.)

So, anyway, Ashley gets to Victory Lane, and there’s her husband taking his helmet off. He’s so dazed with disbelief that he has actually won this thing that he’s a little glassy-eyed. Almost as if he barely recognizes her.

She barely gets to plant one good smooch on his mouth before here comes his whole adoring team of drivers to hug and kiss him, even though they’ve lost to him: Michael Andretti, then Tony Kanaan, then Danica Patrick.

Everybody except Marco, who, outside the track hospital, is being asked about his crash and showing it hardly means a thing to him, considering.

“It was a big one, all right,” Marco said. “All I can say is, I’m so happy for Dario Franchitti.”

That’s the kind of guy Ashley’s husband is -- beloved. Appreciated. Felt for.

Largely his was supposed to be a supporting role at Andretti Green Racing: the savvy, hard-luck veteran, mentoring the two bright young stars of IndyCar racing, Marco and Danica.

Franchitti is 34 now, pretty old for a race driver nowadays. He has been in America for a decade but spent the first six years exiled from Indy because of the CART boycott. Since he finally got to Indy in 2002, his best finish had been third, in ’04.

When he arrived in the U.S., from Edinburgh, nobody could quite figure out how a guy with such an Italian name could speak with such a burr.

Turned out his grandfather, a restaurateur, had migrated from Italy to Scotland, so Dario was indeed a native Scot.

Took a while to get the pronunciation of his surname too. Some at first said, “Fran-Chitty” until they learned it’s “Fran-KEETI.”

Anyway, back to the 500, whose end was at first rain-delayed by three hours, and then hastened by another shower at 166 laps of the scheduled 200.

The long delay had begun just past the halfway point, after 113 laps. When the drivers finally took to the track again, Franchitti got a punctured tire just before the restart.

He had to pit, and his stellar teammates left him behind. Off they went, running 1-2-3: Kanaan, Patrick, Marco Andretti, with Michael Andretti running within striking distance.

Now the plot was thicker than the humid air that threatened rain again on Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

As it would turn out, the unscheduled stop “put us on the strategy that won us the race,” Franchitti would say later.

The pivotal moment was the next caution, when the leaders all pitted. Franchitti stayed out and inherited the lead.

On that restart, Kanaan was caught in the crash of Jaques Lazier. Patrick narrowly dodged the wreck. Then she and both Andrettis were stuck in traffic after their stops.

Then Marco went upside down on Lap 162, and Franchitti cruised under caution until the rain started so that on the 166th lap the checkered flag joined the yellow flying.

“Who would have thought it? Can you believe it?” he said in his Scottish lilt and burr. “I’m in shock ... I’m definitely in shock.”

From a guy who’d barely noticed Ashley Judd kissing him, you could believe that.

His wife attended the winner’s news conference but stood silent in a corner. This moment, for once, belonged solely to Dario Franchitti.

--

Ed Hinton covers auto racing for Tribune newspapers.

*

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Indianapolis 500

Results from Sunday’s race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Race was stopped after 415 miles by rain (lap length: 2.5 miles):

*--* RESULTS PL PP DRIVER CAR LAPS COMPLETED 1 (3) Dario Franchitti Dallara 166 laps, 151.774 mph 2 (4) Scott Dixon Dallara 166 laps, running 3 (1) Helio Castroneves Dallara 166 laps, running 4 (5) Sam Hornish Jr. Dallara 166 laps, running 5 (7) Ryan Briscoe Dallara 166 laps, running 6 (12) Scott Sharp Dallara 166 laps, running 7 (10) Tomas Scheckter Dallara 166 laps, running 8 (8) Danica Patrick Dallara 166 laps, running 9 (20) Davey Hamilton Dallara 166 laps, running 10 (19) Vitor Meira Dallara 166 laps, running 11 (13) Jeff Simmons Dallara 166 laps, running 12 (2) Tony Kanaan Dallara 166 laps, running 13 (11) Michael Andretti Dallara 166 laps, running 14 (18) A.J. Foyt IV Dallara 165 laps, running 15 (26) Alex Barron Dallara 165 laps, running 16 (17) Kosuke Matsuura Dallara 165 laps, running 17 (14) Ed Carpenter Dallara 164 laps, crash 18 (21) Sarah Fisher Dallara 164 laps, running 19 (22) Buddy Lazier Dallara 164 laps, running 20 (15) Darren Manning Dallara 164 laps, running 21 (23) Roger Yasukawa Dallara 164 laps, running 22 (6) Dan Wheldon Dallara 163 laps, crash 23 (32) Richie Hearn Dallara 163 laps, running 24 (9) Marco Andretti Dallara 162 laps, crash 25 (16) Buddy Rice Dallara 162 laps, crash 26 (25) Al Unser Jr. Dallara 161 laps, running 27 (28) Jaques Lazier Panoz 155 laps, crash 28 (30) Marty Roth Dallara 148 laps, crash 29 (33) Phil Giebler Panoz 106 laps, crash 30 (24) John Andretti Dallara 95 laps, crash 31 (29) Milka Duno Dallara 65 laps, crash 32 (27) Jon Herb Dallara 51, laps, crash 33 (31) Roberto Moreno Panoz 36 laps, crash

*--*

--

RACE STATISTICS

* Time of race: 2 hours 44 minutes 3.5608 seconds.

* Margin of victory: 0.361 seconds under caution.

* Caution flags: 11 for 55 laps.

* Lead changes: 23 among nine drivers.

* Lap leaders: Kanaan 1-2, Castroneves 3, Kanaan 4-13, Castroneves 14-17, Kanaan 18-26, Castroneves 27-40, Marco Andretti 41-46, Dixon 47-53, Kanaan 54-68, Dixon 69-71, Hornish 72-73, Franchitti 74-88, Dixon 89, Michael Andretti 90, Kanaan 91-100, Simmons 101, Marco Andretti 102-107, Kanaan 108-116, Marco Andretti 117, Kanaan 118-136, Franchitti 137-143, J.Lazier 144-145, Kanaan 146-154, Franchitti 155-166.

* Points standings (After five of 17 races): 1. Dixon, 184. 2. Wheldon, 183. 3. Franchitti, 181. 4. Castroneves, 171. 5. (tie), Kanaan and Hornish, 151. 7. Scheckter, 130. 8. Sharp, 110. 9. Patrick, 109. 10. Meira 103.

--

The outsiders

Only five American drivers have finished first in the Indianapolis 500 since 1993. The list of foreign drivers who have won it:

2007 -- Dario Franchitti, Scotland

2005 -- Dan Wheldon, England

2003 -- Gil de Ferran, Brazil

2002 -- Helio Castroneves, Brazil

2001 -- Helio Castroneves, Brazil

2000 -- Juan Montoya, Colombia

1999 -- Kenny Brack, Sweden

1997 -- Arie Luyendyk, Netherlands

1995 -- Jacques Villeneuve, Canada

1993 -- Emerson Fittipaldi, Brazil

1990 -- Arie Luyendyk, Netherlands

1989 -- Emerson Fittipaldi, Brazil

1966 -- Graham Hill, England

1965 -- Jimmy Clark, Scotland

1946 -- George Robson, England

1920 -- Gaston Chevrolet, France

1916 -- Dario Resta, Italy

1915 -- Ralph DePalma, Italy

1914 -- Rene Thomas, France

1913 -- Jules Goux, France

--

Source: Associated Press

Los Angeles Times


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