Bell has a blast finishing fourth

As the stars of the IndyCar Series battled it out for the Indianapolis 500, part-time series driver Townsend Bell quietly brought home a fourth-place finish Sunday.

It was the best finish in three Indy 500 appearances for Bell, 34, a Santa Monica driver who was hired to compete in this year’s race by the team KV Racing Technology.

“I had a blast out there,” said Bell, who started 24th, moved up to 12th, fell back after a mishap during his first pit stop and then steadily climbed through the field again at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

“We were smart when we had to be, aggressive when we needed to be,” he said.

A highlight of his day was dueling with Paul Tracy, another veteran hired to drive a separate KV Racing car for the 500.

“We went through one side-by-side [lap] where I didn’t lift [off the accelerator], he didn’t lift,” Bell said. “I know we’re teammates, but we’ve become such good friends the last year or so that it’s like playing a video game with your buddy. You’re like, ‘No way am I going to give up.’ ”

Asked whether Sunday’s showing might lead to a full-time IndyCar Series ride, Bell replied, “We’ll see. I’ve been doing it long enough to not plan or feel like I deserve anything. You just work hard and hope that things turn out.”

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Tracy solid

Tracy, meanwhile, finished ninth after a solid run in his first Indy 500 since 2002, when he lost a controversial race to Sunday’s winner, Helio Castroneves.

“It’s not the finish I wanted,” said Tracy, 40, who started 13th. “I would have liked to have been in the top five.”

The Canadian closed in on the leaders at one point but said, “I ran over some debris from [Tony Kanaan’s] accident and damaged the underside” of Tracy’s car, “so I was not able to stay there.”

Tracy thought he had won the 2002 race after passing Castroneves on the final lap. But an accident elsewhere on the track occurred simultaneously, which brought out the yellow flag that froze the field.

Race officials, ruling that Tracy hadn’t completed his pass before the field was frozen, awarded the win to Castroneves and said Tracy finished second, a result Tracy has always disputed.

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Petty’s debut

Richard Petty’s first year as a car owner in the Indy 500 ended with his driver John Andretti finishing 19th after starting 28th.

Andretti’s car -- painted with the red-and-blue paint scheme and No. 43 that Petty made famous as a seven-time NASCAR champion -- mainly was prepared by the IndyCar team Dreyer & Reinbold Racing.

“Our goal was a top-10 [finish] and we were moving toward that end,” Andretti said, until he was pushed toward the wall on a restart that knocked him back several positions.

Toward the finish, “we took new tires and some fuel, hoping to drive through the field,” he said. “But the track was just too slippery to make a move. So we probably had a better car than our finish today.”

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And finally

Ryan Briscoe, who started second alongside his Team Penske teammate Castroneves, blamed a bad set of tires for temporarily putting him one lap behind the leaders and ultimately resulting in a 15th-place finish. Their other teammate, Will Power, said his fifth-place finish “was a good result,” as was “not hitting the wall all month.”

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james.peltz@latimes.com

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Gaining ground

Best finishes by women in the Indianapolis 500:

*--* Year Driver Fin. Laps 2009 Danica Patrick 3 200 2005 Danica Patrick 4 200 2006 Danica Patrick 8 200 2007 Danica Patrick 8 166 1978 Janet Guthrie 9 190 1992 Lyn St. James 11 193 1997 Lyn St. James 13 186 1996 Lyn St. James 14 153 2009 Sarah Fisher 17 200 2007 Sarah Fisher 18 164 1994 Lyn St. James 19 170 2008 Milka Duno 19 185 *--*

Source: Associated Press