Helio Castroneves is back at Indianapolis Motor Speedway for his fifth opportunity to become the all-time winner of the Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge.

This could be his best chance yet, the four-time Indy winner said Tuesday on the first day of official practice.

Castroneves (photo, top) posted the fifth-fastest lap of last month’s Indianapolis 500 Open Test at IMS, and he backed it up with a strong first day Tuesday -- the surest signs yet that he and Meyer Shank Racing w/ Curb Agajanian are primed to again contend for the biggest single-day prize in motorsports.

“This place brings me amazing memories, but after the Open Test I thought, ‘Wow, this one comes with a little more energy,’” Castroneves said, smiling. “So, I feel good.

“You feel good also because the team is doing an amazing job (this season).”

Marcus Armstrong and Felix Rosenqvist are MSR’s full-season drivers, and they both rank in the top 11 of the standings after six of 18 races. Rosenqvist won the pole and finished second in last month’s Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach, and Armstrong led eight laps in the season’s only oval race to date – the Good Ranchers 250 at Phoenix Raceway – and finished fifth.

Castroneves, who won the “500” in 2001, 2002, 2009 and 2021, said his additional optimism stems from the fact the crew of his No. 06 Cleveland Cliffs Honda is virtually intact from last year, a race the Brazilian felt he could have won. He has the same engineer and essentially the same mechanics, although the crew chief is new.

It seemed to show Tuesday, with his best lap high on the leaderboard most of the day before settling for 15th among 33 drivers.

“All the pieces are coming together,” Castroneves said.

Those pieces nearly came together last year. Castroneves finished 10th, the second time in the five years since his latest Indy win that he finished in the top 10. He finished seventh in 2022. He also thought he should have placed higher last year.

“When I finished the race, I tell you I was already thinking about this year,” Castroneves said. “I was actually angry because (we had) a lot of small mistakes, and even with the small mistakes we still raced into the top 10. That’s where my frustration came in because the car was excellent, the (chassis) setup was really good, everything (was).

“So, if we want to win this race, we’ve got to do it like we did in 2021. I said, ‘Let’s work on that.’”

Helio Castroneves

Castroneves (photo, above) turned 51 last weekend, and he has shown no signs of slowing down. The oldest driver in this field is aiming for his 26th start in “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing.”

Al Unser also took five shots at a fifth Indy win after capturing his fourth in 1987. A.J. Foyt’s last Indy win came in 1977, and he tried 15 more times. Rick Mears only took one shot at a history-making fifth Indy win, that bid ending with an accident in the 1992 race.

It can be argued whether Foyt or Unser came the closest to winning a fifth. Foyt finished second in the 1979 race won by Mears, and Unser was third in 1988 and 1992. In the latter, Unser was positioned to win if the late-race duel between Al Unser Jr. and Scott Goodyear ended with an accident, but it did not.

Castroneves is one of nine past Indy winners with a chance to earn another spot on the iconic Borg-Warner Trophy. Takuma Sato (No. 75 Amada Honda) of Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing is aiming for his third Indy win, and it’s a good one. Sato used the car to qualify second in last year’s race, and he finished ninth. He had the 14th-fastest lap in Tuesday’s practice.

Team Penske’s Josef Newgarden and Chip Ganassi Racing’s Alex Palou have combined to win the past three “500s,” and they must be considered the favorites to do so Sunday, May 24 (FOX, FOX Deportes, FOX One, INDYCAR Radio powered by OnlyBulls). Palou won the pole in 2023 and has finished in the top five in each of the past three years and four of the past five.

Palou has a great chance to become just the seventh driver in history to win Indy in consecutive years. Newgarden, Castroneves, Unser, Bill Vukovich, Mauri Rose and Wilbur Shaw are the others.

A win by Newgarden this year would make him the only driver other than Shaw to win the race three times in four years. Rose won three of four starts on either side of World War II. Palou’s No. 10 DHL Chip Ganassi Racing Honda and Newgarden’s No. 2 Shell Fuel Rewards Team Penske Chevrolet were first and fourth, respectively, Tuesday.

Chip Ganassi Racing’s Scott Dixon scored his only Indy win in 2008. A win this year would break Juan Pablo Montoya’s “record” for years between wins. Montoya’s two wins were 15 years apart (2000, 2015). Dixon opened practice with the fifth-fastest lap.

Will Power will be an interesting watch in his first year with Andretti Global. Neither driver nor team have had much success on this oval in recent years. Power hasn’t had a top-10 finish since 2019, and Andretti Global’s last victory was in 2017. Power had the 27th-fastest lap in Tuesday’s six-hour session in the No. 26 TWG AI Honda.

Alexander Rossi won the “500” for Andretti Herta Autosport in 2016, and he has top-five finishes in three of the past four years. Tuesday, he was 13th on the speed chart in ECR’s No. 21 Java House Chevrolet.

Last year, Ryan Hunter-Reay, the 2014 winner, could sense his best chance to win the “500” again. He was leading the race when his car ran out of fuel one lap before the final pit stop. He has another great chance to win this year’s race in the No. 31 Prize Picks Arrow McLaren Chevrolet that was 29th on Opening Day.

Andretti Global’s Marcus Ericsson (No. 28 Phoenix Investors Honda) is the other former winner in this field, and he has driven masterfully beginning with his 2022 victory. He finished second to Newgarden in 2023 and crossed the finish line in the same position last year before his car was dealt a penalty for improper equipment modifications, forcing him to finish 31st. He was 23rd in the week’s first practice.