Darron Cummings / AP

Dario Franchitti celebrates after winning the Indianapolis 500. Franchitti's victory Sunday was his second at Indianapolis.

More than an hour before Castroneves stalled in pit road, teammate Will Power’s crew left part of the fuel rig in his tank — a costly mistake that forced Power to take a penalty run through pit road and dropped him out of the top five.

And moments after Castroneves’ error, his other teammate, Ryan Briscoe, careened into the wall and out of the race while Penske, The Captain, looked on — hand on hip, seemingly amazed at how his smooth-running machine fell so far, so fast.

“As a team, we made too many mistakes today,” Power said. “We had a bloody fast car. I think we could’ve hung with Dario, no problem. It’s the lesson of this place. You can’t make mistakes.”

Power’s problems were part of an overall sloppy day at “The Greatest Spectacle In Racing,” which featured nine caution periods, including one when Davey Hamilton, the oldest driver in the race, crashed before the drivers made it out of Turn 2 on the first lap.

Dixon, Franchitti’s teammate, lost his left front tire coming out of pit road. Raphael Matos, who got to second early in the race, dropped back when his right rear tire came off — then went out when he hit the wall on lap 72.

Power crept his way back into the top five briefly, but another pit-road mix-up cost him time. The 29-year-old Australian, first before the race in the IndyCar standings, finished eighth.

Andretti started 16th and actually led one lap thanks in part to his early use of the speed-boosting “push to pass” button that was making its Indy debut this year. But without as good a car as the leaders, he fell back.

Nobody ran a cleaner, more tactically superior race than Franchitti. He had the third-fastest car in qualifying, which also helped, as did a little bit of racin’ luck at the end — the kind that has come to him much more easily in the open-wheel world than in his half-year in NASCAR in 2008.

But Franchitti’s departure didn’t mean the end of Ganassi’s stay in NASCAR. The owner won the Daytona 500 with Jamie McMurray at the wheel in February.

Had Franchitti had that kind of stock car in 2008, he joked, he might not have been sitting where he was Sunday.

“It all worked out perfectly,” he said. “We went on a little holiday, came back and now, we’re having some fun.”

Back home again in Indiana — and back in Victory Lane.