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Indy 500. Race Review. Penske Racing's Helio Castroneves completed a remarkable comeback story by taking his third Indy 500 win of his career at the Brickyard's showpiece event, just over a month after he was up in court on tax evasion charges.

The manner in which Castroneves controlled the race after the final restart may have made it look like the pole sitter had had things all his own way on Memorial Day, but in reality he was helped out when his main rivals hit trouble, having spent much of the middle portion of the race running out of position. His car worked perfectly when it mattered though, and he pulled effortlessly clear in the closing stages to win from Panther Racing's Dan Wheldon and Andretti Green's Danica Patrick, who made history by becoming the first woman to finish in the top three at the Brickyard.

For a long time, it looked like the race was heading for the Chip Ganassi team, as 2008 winner Scott Dixon and 2007 winner Dario Franchitti controlled most of the running, but both of them hit pit stop trouble, with Franchitti having a sticking fuel hose and Dixon a tardy final stop, and they ended up down in 6th and 7th by the end, unable to work their way back up to the front.

All in all, there wasn't an awful lot of passing across the 200 laps, with the drivers complaining about a dirty track hindering their attempts to draft past their rivals. The resulting frustration and the dirty track at times led to a number of nasty accidents.

The Ganassi and Penske teams dominated the event. Ryan Briscoe led early on and could have been in line for a top result, but he suffered a sudden loss of grip after his second pit stop, and was forced to pit again. Having worked his way back up to 8th, he short-fuelled on his final stop to get to 2nd behind Castroneves, but was forced to make a late splash and dash, and ended up a disappointing 15th. Will Power in the third Penske entry couldn't quite get on the ultimate pace, but came home a creditable 5th.

The clashes started early on, with Mario Moraes, a pre-race dark horse, tagging Marco Andretti on the opening lap, ruining both of their races. A number of drivers got caught out at turn four throughout the event, including Graham Rahal, who ran in the top 5 early on, and Justin Wilson, who spun 360 degrees into the wall after earlier performing a similar trick in the pit lane.

One of the pre-race favourites, Tony Kanaan, who has been a frontrunner for many years without ever winning the Indy 500, had a violent shunt at half distance, after his car suffered some sort of breakage on one of the long straights, pitching him into the concrete wall. He emerged relatively unscathed, save a slight limp, but disappointed at another winless Indy adventure.

The other big accident was in the closing stages, as Vitor Meira, who had earlier escaped unhurt from a dramatic fuel fire in his pitbox, was tagged by rookie Raphael Matos, who had run strongly in the top six for the first part of the race before falling back after pit stop issues. Meira was pitched into the wall, and skidded down the length of the straight on his side. He was taken to hospital complaining of back problems, and with that and the fire, it was a very bad day at the office for the poor driver.

That crash triggered the last of eight caution periods, with Castroneves then controlling the restart to take the win. Wheldon spent the closing stages more preoccupied with holding off Patrick than chasing the Brazilian. Townsend Bell came home fourth for KV Racing in a stunning drive for the American driver in a one-off Indy drive.

Will Power was fifth, ahead of the Ganassi pair, with Ed Carpenter taking 8th for Vision Racing. Paul Tracy couldn't produce a fairytale win, and came home 9th, with Hideki Mutoh rounding out the top ten in his Andretti Green machine, despite driving across the grass along the back straight after the last restart, and somehow keeping his car going.

Alex Tagliani was the top rookie in 11th, from 33rd and last on the grid, one spot ahead of Tomas Scheckter's Dale Coyne entry. Alex Lloyd, in his silly pink liveried car, finished 13th despite losing a lap in the early stages, with Scott Sharp 14th and Briscoe 15th.

The less glamorous female entrant Sarah Fisher 17th in her self-run car, with Mike Conway dropping to 18th after running in the top ten during the middle portion of the race. NASCAR driver John Andretti struggled to 19th, the last of the finishers to complete the full 200 laps.

At the checkered flag, Castroneves got a standing ovation from the 400,000 packed into the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, a man who remains loved by the fans despite his dodgy accounting. He managed to perform his trademark climb up the catchfencing despite the efforts of some track marshals to try and stop him. He also got the bottle of milk, which was nice.

Overall, it wasn't a classic race by any stretch of the imagination, but as a piece of sporting theatre, we got the fairytale result.

(R) - denotes rookie driver.