Tony Kanaan gets a little extra luck in Indy 500 win
Tony Kanaan’s good-luck charm was watching the Indianapolis 500 when he showed the necklace she returned to him only a few days prior.
The woman is Andrea Irwin, and her family first received the necklace in May 2004 when she was about to enter surgery for a problem stemming from a birth defect. She was 15 at the time.
Kanaan’s necklace was given to him by his mother for protection as he raced. He believed the high school girl needed it more.
“He told my parents, I don’t know if you believe in these things, but my mother gave it to me,” she said.
Irwin recovered, graduated from high school in northern Indiana and college in Indianapolis, married and now works as a physical therapist assistant. She said the necklace belonged to the driver who needed some racing luck at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Irwin said she tried to give Kanaan the necklace back around the time his son, Leonardo, was born in 2008. He wanted her to keep it.
She decided to give it another shot this month, packaging it with a letter and sending it with a friend who was going to the track. Kanaan accepted it. He said he was touched by the fact she’s made such a recovery.
“I always knew he had the talent to win the 500, but he needed some luck,” she said. “And by George it worked.”
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Wed May 29, 2013 4:37 pm
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