INDYCAR MEDIA CONFERENCE

May 28, 2021

Marco Andretti

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: Marco Andretti, clearly you found something today, is that accurate?

MARCO ANDRETTI: Found it Saturday night and confirmed it Sunday. Double confirmed it today. Yeah, I feel pretty confident. A little bummed because I think we would have been easily top nine car.

500 miles, so I need to stay unscathed, slowly pick them off. Hopefully we have the strategy and stops to do that. Guys looking good in the pits as well. Everybody is feeling good. We just have to execute and try to be smart, risk versus reward to try to get to the front.

Q. You mentioned yesterday it's something in the floor you found?

MARCO ANDRETTI: Yeah, it was the floor. We can't understand why. They wouldn't let me say it publicly anyway. Yeah, I mean, we just put a new floor on, which was on paper not as good as my teammate's. We have bigger issues, I know how to get around this place. I was basically just telling them that there's something wrong. Even dad would confirm it. We'd be in the meetings, we have to find it.

I'm actually lucky we made the race. I'm happy actually. Way happier after Carb Day this year than last even starting on pole.

Q. Your grandfather was in this morning, said you figured out what was wrong. He said you think you can win the race. He said he hadn't heard that from you since your rookie year. Do you feel like you can win the race?

MARCO ANDRETTI: Every time I've said that, I've led the race. Eight or nine times, I don't know the stat. Maybe the last he heard it was 2006.

I've had a car to win this race a lot of times. I've said that before the race. We just have to see if the stars align, do our job, slowly get there, hopefully stay out of messes. But the field is pretty stacked, very talented, hopefully very smart.

Yeah, I mean, hopefully I can keep that streak going. Every time I've said I have the car to do it we've led. Coming from a little further back than I'm used to. We'll try.

Q. You want a cooler race or a warmer temperature race?

MARCO ANDRETTI: I think either/or. I think Sunday was hot, today was cool. We were good both times. I'm good either way.

Q. They said there was a possible GCU issue.

MARCO ANDRETTI: I'm not a Carb Day fan, but today it saved my Indy 500. That's why you have Carb Day. There was a bad electrical box we would have found on lap one. That's what Carb Day is all about. We're lucky. Everything from here on out is a bonus, so we're happy.

Q. You dodged a bullet on the left front?

MARCO ANDRETTI: It was tape. Hot tires, picks up the tape. I knew once we got to speed, it would have spit it out.

THE MODERATOR: Seems like the world has been lifted off your shoulder after the last couple practices.

MARCO ANDRETTI: Yeah, I mean, I'm sorry to even -- whoever interviewed me after qualifying, Did you say that? We're not happy right now.

Yeah, after my first run, I don't think we would have made the race. I'm lucky we were able to bring that package out to get it in the race. Everything, like I said, is a bonus from here on out.

Q. Does today's performance solidify how confident you're feel going into the race?

MARCO ANDRETTI: From my experience here, when you're able to reconfirm the car is good in different conditions, the car is good. If it would have rained all day today and tomorrow, we were ready. Today confirms that we were ready, right?

But I'm happy it didn't rain because we found the electrical box that we would have had a DNF in the Indy 500. So we're really, really lucky.

THE MODERATOR: Is your excitement level maybe amped up a bit? This is your only race of the season. You want to do well.

MARCO ANDRETTI: Yeah, I mean, exactly. Every year you know you have a car that can do it, it's nice. I wish we had better track position. Beggars can't be choosers. I've dodged a couple bullets already. One was getting in the race with a bad floor, the other was at bad box we would have found on race day. Really happy. We have to methodically do it and try to get there in a smart way when it counts.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you.