But it isn't.
In fact, the man standing in the car in the middle isn't even entered in the race.
The man in the middle is Mario's twin brother, Aldo. Mario had burned his face in a crash a few days before this photo was taken. Whispers of the Andretti curse already were in circulation, and Mario didn't want to add fuel to that fire (pardon the pun) by being photographed with burns on his face.
So rather than enshrine an image of himself bearing a reminder of one of his many crashes, he had identical twin brother Aldo stand in. And hardly anybody noticed the difference.
Later that same year, brother Aldo ended his racing career with an end-over-end sprint car oopsie that broke 14 bones in his face, leaving him not so identical to brother Mario.
Aldo died from Covid in 2020.
If you want a better look, there's a larger image here.
