Updated: Indy 500 Winner Drove For RSM Team

Updated: Dan Wheldon won the 100th anniversary of the Indianapolis 500 and Oriol Servia finished fifth. Wheldon was running second when leader J.R. Hildebrand crashed into the wall coming out of Turn 4 on the last lap; Wheldon made the winning pass with about 150 yards to go and Hildebrand coasted across the finish line in second place. After a review, Servia was placed into sixth position.

A smile crossed Oriol Servia's face, the kind one gets when recounting good times spent with an old flame.

"Rancho Santa Margarita," he said, "that place was nice."

Servia was getting his first taste of the major leagues of auto racing back in 2000 when he was signed to drive for Cal Wells, who went to work every day in a pristine race car shop at what is now the corner of Tomas and Aventura. 

Inside the walls of Precision Preparation Inc., turbo-powered Indy-type cars were built and engineered for the CART FedEx Championship Series.

Today, Servia is far removed from RSM, but he will be in the center of the Indycar universe. He will be starting on the outside of the front row of the 100th anniversary of the Indianapolis 500.

"It was an amazing shop," Servia recalled. "The people were really lucky to be living there. They were so happy to be there and not in Indianapolis."

Today in Indianapolis, Servia will be driving for Newman/Haas Racing after qualifying at 227.168 mph. Pole sitter Alex Tagliani (227.472) and Scott Dixon (227.340) were the only drivers to go faster.

Servia, who finished second in the Champ Car World Series in 2005 while driving for the team co-owned by actor Paul Newman, currently sits third in the standings after four IZOD Indycar Series races.

A Spaniard who lives parttime in Santa Monica, Servia had one of the great looking Indy cars of all time when he drove the lime yellow Telefonica car for PPI, which typically produced attractive cars sponsored by companies such as MCI and Pioneer. This year he is sponsored by Telemundo, the Spanish language television network.

Servia is not the only driver with an RSM connection who will be in the world's most famous race on the world's most famous racetrack. Directly behind him in Row 2, starting sixth, is Dan Wheldon, who also raced for PPI in 2000.

Like Servia, Wheldon has fond memories of south Orange County. He visited RSM about seven months ago to show his wife, Susie, the old race shop. Well, the building, anyway.

Though Servia was racing Champ Cars in the FedEx Championship Series in 2000, Wheldon was in the feeder league, the Toyota Atlantic Series.

"I lived in Newport Beach, but every day I was in RSM," Wheldon said. "I came to the shop every day. I loved it. There was a great atmosphere on that team. Cal totally took care of me.

"I usually took breakfast at home, then went to the race shop and had lunch with the boys."

Two of Wheldon's most vivid memories are of "a great car wash"—the Town Center Car Wash—and "a good sandwich place."

He doesn't remember the name of the sandwich shop, but he remembers how much he liked RSM as his career was just getting under way. He finished second in the standings that year.

Wheldon is racing in the 500 for Bryan Herta Autosport, and will be carrying the colors of William Rast on the sidepods of his car. It's a one-off race for Wheldon, who won the Indy 500 in 2005, the year he also won the IndyCar Series championship.

PPI, which helped develop the Toyota racing engine, closed its operation in Rancho Santa Margarita after the 2001 season and focused on NASCAR out of a North Carolina shop. Today, Wells is executive vice president at Michael Waltrip Racing.

 "A lot of people from the team lived around the area, so we’d drive to their houses on the weekend," Wheldon said."I really did like it. I loved it there. It was cool."

"Tell everybody in Rancho I said 'Hi.' "