Mario Andretti on why Alonso will shine at Indy

"The timing couldn’t be better,” Mario says immediately, involuntarily. “This is the perfect opportunity for Fernando because he has nothing really going on in Formula 1 currently – McLaren are not contenders at the moment – but he is still in his prime. So while he’s still so vibrant, this shot at Indianapolis is truly awesome for him, for McLaren, Honda, for Michael’s team [Andretti Autosport], for IndyCar…

“Quite honestly, I’d say anything like this is great for the whole sport, period. It attracts a lot more media attention to both IndyCar and Formula 1. It’s a major deal that he’s even stated this desire and made this decision; so if he does well – and I think he will – then that’s going to be a real feather in his cap.”

Andretti, of course, is the racer who’s done it all and won it all. Even in the 24 Hours of Le Mans, where he kept missing out on overall victory, it’s often overlooked that he does have a class win. Rivaled only by Sir Stirling Moss in terms of sheer driving versatility, Mario knows whereof he speaks when it comes to comparing top-rank open-wheel racecars.

But asked whether he thinks IndyCars and F1 cars differ from each other more in 2017 than when he was regularly racing both, flying Concorde across the Atlantic in the ’70s and early ’80s, he says it’s not a factor worth discussing.

“Let’s face it, it’s adapting to ovals, not the cars themselves, that we need to think about here,” he says. “A driver in a racecar is looking for a feel, and the best drivers – and Fernando is one of the very, very best – will always find it. It may not be his regular environment, but a top driver will find a way to relate to any true racecar.”

Andretti cites two recent Indy 500 performances by rookies in his son Michael’s race team, drivers who came from quite alien backgrounds, NASCAR and GP2/F1, respectively.

“Look at Kurt Busch; he finished sixth in 2014. Look at Alexander [Rossi] last year; he won the race! Andretti Autosport has got an extra dimension and an engineering force that’s almost second to none.

“It has always been Michael’s stringent policy that everyone – drivers, race engineers, all the technical staff – shares data and information. They all sit in the same room after their day’s work, and they share what they found. Everything’s there, on every laptop. So Ryan [Hunter-Reay], Marco [Andretti], Alex, Takuma [Sato] – they all know what each other has, how their cars have been set up. Their race engineers know every last detail about how their counterparts have set up the other cars. And then they all talk about what they’re planning to change and why they’re doing it.

“So there’s a wealth of information available there, and that’s so helpful for a driver coming from the outside – absolutely golden. Personally, as an established driver, I would have hated that! When we were teammates, I never even wanted to share information with my own son! But now he’s a team owner, Michael wants his team and business to flourish as a whole; he wants all his cars at the front and so he’s picking no favorites. Everything has to be open-book.

“Fernando will benefit so much from that – and you know he’s going to be listening and absorbing it all.”

On track

Michael Andretti has always said that although Indianapolis Motor Speedway is very fast and very daunting, the Indy 500 is actually the best race for a driver to make his oval debut, due to the practice time available. He reiterated his point this week during the press conferences, and his dad wholeheartedly concurs.

“Absolutely, absolutely, it’s the only race on the planet that will give you that much time to prepare,” says Mario. “Each day Fernando will get six hours of practice, weather allowing.

“They’ll first send him out there loaded up with downforce, and he may think, ‘Oh, it’s a piece of cake.’ Then as he starts getting confidence, they’ll gradually take downforce off, he’ll get used to the car moving around a bit more, then a little bit more, and on and on. As he gets more confident still, they’ll have him practice slipstreaming.

“That there is another benefit of having Alonso teamed with five other drivers, four of them solid Speedway veterans. [The fifth will be another rookie, Jack Harvey, driving a Michael Shank-run entry on behalf of Andretti Autosport.] Between them they can create their own mock ‘race’ during practice sessions, to throw a bunch of dirty air in the rookie’s direction and get him used to the loss of downforce. That’s exactly what they did for Kurt, who started off like a fish out of water but learned fast.”

Consultation

As a regular advisor, observer, guru – call the role what you will – for Andretti Autosport, and indeed for any IndyCar driver seeking advice, Mario will be available for Alonso to consult. So what’s he going to say?

“Well, you know, it’s more about myself and Michael making ourselves available if there’s questions he needs answered,” says Mario. “Alex did that at Indy last year – just sat down and chatted with us informally, and the questions he was asking made us think, ‘Hey, this kid gets it; he’s asking the right questions.’

“So I’m sure Fernando has already thought about things like the speed factor. At Indianapolis like nowhere else he’s ever raced, it’s going to be constant high speed, and that can be brutal. The slightest mistake is magnified at 225mph.

“And the other thing to remind him is not to overcorrect. Road-racing specialists have a tendency to overcorrect on ovals – we’ve seen many examples in IndyCar in the past. If you feel yourself losing the back end, you almost have to let it go. If you put on too much opposite lock and the car then grips and follows its front wheels, you’re going head-on into the wall.”

The rest of the lessons, Alonso will learn as he goes along… and some aspects are somewhat in the hands of the team, too.

“We don’t want him to get too brave and spook himself,” says Andretti, “because when you do that, it can be very tricky getting that confidence back. So the team will not allow that to happen. They’ll be careful not to take off too much downforce too soon.”

Dealing with the jitters

If it’s hard to imagine Alonso being spooked by anything he encounters in the cockpit, he also comes across as a gladiator who remains oblivious to the pressure of ‘the moment’. His coiled-spring potential and steel-nerved aggression are the result of a force coming from within rather than without. And yet Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Sunday, May 28, complete with its amphitheatrically stacked and packed grandstands, will be unlike anything he has encountered before. And even Andretti recalls first-day jitters at the Brickyard.

“Yeah, when you look at the full house at Indianapolis it’s daunting,” he agrees. “I remember my first experience at Indy as a driver. I’d never raced in front of a crowd of more than 35,000 people before. Before I went out to qualify, I was thinking about it – 250,000 people were gonna be watching me, because I’m the only one on track. That really got to me while I was sitting in the pits.

“But when you get up to speed, you’re focused, you’re in your element, and you forget all about it. Everyone deals with it in their own way; I don’t think any two drivers are the same. But I think Fernando has been around long enough and been exposed to enough of that kind of pressure that he will cope just fine.

“Don’t get me wrong. I’m certain that some time on race day, he’s going to have a real ‘Wow!’ moment, but it will only be a moment. Once he’s in his ‘office’, the cars are fired up and he’s on the warm-up laps, all that apprehension will disappear, because he’s just focusing on the job.”

There will be distractions between track outings, though. At most Formula 1 grands prix, drivers are able to operate in a bubble, very distant from the spectators and media. He’s about to discover what it’s like to work out of an open garage in an open paddock, and be regularly pestered for selfies, autographs and quotes.

“Yeah, there’s going to be so much fan and press attention on him because he’s a stranger to the Speedway, or certainly since F1 was last on the roadcourse,” says Andretti. “It’s going to be unusual for him, but I hope he embraces it and really cherishes the moment; I think he’ll quickly recognize that he is very, very welcome. I think he’s gonna enjoy the camaraderie of all the drivers, and then within the team he will find a second family, no question about it. He’ll appreciate that.”

The big question

Andretti, as ever, is not afraid to be put on the spot. Ask him if he thinks Alonso is going to fulfill the second part of his three-part ambition to become motorsport’s only Triple Crown winner aside from Graham Hill, and the old legend takes a very realistic view.

“We’ve seen examples of Indy 500s that have startled us – as recently as last year,” he says. “You never know how this race is gonna unfold. So I think the team will give him a conservative setup because it would be stupid to do anything else, and it will be something he can maximize all day.

“Well being who he is, and how quickly I think he’s going to adapt to this style of racing, I suspect he’s going to be right there, top 10 or top 12 for most of the race and then toward the end he’ll be really finding his way. His engineer, Eric Bretzman, is a very successful and talented guy who will do a good job for him, just like Craig Hampson did for Kurt Busch. So if you combine that with Fernando’s talent, I think he’s got a great opportunity to go home very happy.”

A happy winner? Andretti isn’t prepared to say, but that’s the wisdom of experience. Mario, better than most, knows that Indianapolis is one of those strange racing arena where it seems anything is possible, good and bad. He won in 1969, but his list of woulda/shoulda/coulda follow-ups is enough to break even a heart of stone. So while you’d probably be brave to put money on Alonso winning Indy at his first attempt, as recently as 2011, JR Hildebrand was within one corner of doing just that. Also note that Juan Pablo Montoya in 2000 (Ganassi) and Helio Castroneves in ’01 (Penske) were IMS rookies when they scored their first wins, and Alonso’s Andretti Autosport-Honda is going to be as potent as their cars were, relative to the opposition.

Andretti agrees with the comparison, pauses, then adds: “Let me put it this way. Even though Monaco is probably the most suitable circuit for McLaren this year, by being in Indy, I think Fernando is going to come away from that weekend happier than if he was over there in his usual car. And I think that’s also what he’s hoping and expecting, as well.”