For Vasser, the Soreness Comes Later

Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the U.S. 500 was that nobody was injured in the 12-car prestart accident.

Winner Jimmy Vasser, whose contact with the car driven by Adrian Fernandez touched off the melee, said his knees were sore.

“I’ve got knots and bruises on both of them and they ache now, but I didn’t feel a thing during the race,” he said.

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Parker Johnstone on his view of the prestart accident:

“I looked up and saw a projectile heading right for me. I ducked and it hit the roll hoop [on his car].

“I thought, ‘If anybody asks me about the last thing going through my mind, I’ll have to say I thought the last thing going through my mind was an upright.’ ”

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The official finish hardly reflected the competitiveness of the first U.S. 500. Vasser’s winning margin was 10.9 seconds over runner-up Mauricio Gugelmin, and third-place finisher Roberto Moreno of Monte Carlo, who had started in the middle of the seventh row, was a lap behind in a Lola-Ford.

“This is the first time that I’m happy to have started on the back of the grid,” Moreno said, alluding to the aborted start.

Asked about a late-race attempt to catch Andre Ribeiro, who was leading at the time, Moreno said:

“My crew kept telling me [on the two-way radio], ‘Try to catch Andre! Try to catch Andre!’

“I kept telling them to shut up. ‘I’m already doing that,’ I said. ‘I’m flat out all the way around.’ ”

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What’s a 500-mile race without an Andretti slowing down?

It happened here.

After a strong showing early in the race, Michael Andretti fell back and was running sixth when his car gave out on the 67th lap.

“Actually, I think this was my lucky day,” he said. “I was lucky to get through the crashes at the start, and then when the car broke, I was lucky I was through Turn 4 and not in the middle of the turn. You would have heard a big bang.”