The 102nd Indianapolis 500 is 71 days
away! This is the 32nd day of the 102 Stats in 102 Days Until the 102nd Indy
500.
Each day from now until the Saturday
before the Indianapolis 500, we’ll post a list of stats related to the race.
Some are well-known statistics, while others are a little more in-depth.
Here is a look at the most laps completed
in a single race by a driver who finished in last place. While attrition rates
have been lowered extensively over the last several years (nine of the drivers
on this list were added in the last 20 years), the record of 74 laps by last
place came several decades ago. This is the top 10.
- Bill Homeier: 74 laps (1954)
- Greg Ray: 67 laps (2000)
- Juan Pablo Montoya: 63 laps (2016)
- Jay Howard: 45 laps (2017)
- Graham Rahal: 44 laps (2014)
- Roberto Moreno: 36 laps (2007)
- Graham Rahal: 36 laps (2008)
- Danny Sullivan: 29 laps (1993)
- Greg Ray: 28 laps (2002)
- A.J. Foyt IV: 26 laps (2004)
Notes of Interest
- Bill Homeier set a record for most laps
completed by a last-place finisher in 1951, when he completed 74 laps. Homeier
retired after completed a third of the laps due to an accident in the pits.
That year, 31 drivers completed at least half of the laps (former race winner
Johnnie Parsons dropped out after 79 laps with engine problems), and 19 drivers
completed the race. That was matched in 2014, with 31 cars racing past Lap 100.
- Greg Ray is on this list twice, one of
only nine drivers to finish last twice. He completed 67 laps in the 2000, and
even led the first 26 laps from the pole position. But Ray brought out the
first caution on Lap 66, tagging the wall in Turn 2, which damaged the
suspension. The crew repaired his car enough to return to the race, only for
him to crash again two laps later (leader’s 143rd lap), strong damage this time
putting him out of the race. (No stats as of yet of other drivers who have hit
the wall in two separate incidents in a race.)
-
Ray also completed 28 laps in the 2002 race, hitting the wall in Turn 1 which
brought out the race’s first caution.
- Graham Rahal is also on this list
twice. In the fast and furious 2014 race, which did not see a caution until Lap
149, Rahal retired with electrical problems after 44 laps. He was a victim of
an accident in 2008, after completing 36 laps.
- Juan Pablo Montoya completed the third
most laps of a last-place finisher (63) in 2016, the year after he won his
second Borg Warner Trophy. Montoya crashed in Turn 2 on Lap 64. The race was
the 100th in Indianapolis 500 history.
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