Live the High Line

The 2026 Indianapolis 500 delivered the closest finish in its 110-year history. 

Felix Rosenqvist didn’t just win the race. He was living the high line, a strategy that helped him beat David Malukas by 0.0233 seconds.

For context, the average human blink takes between 150 and 400 milliseconds. The margin of Rosenqvist's victory was 23 milliseconds. 

Malukas was understandably emotional afterward because, by nearly every visible performance metric, he had the fastest car all race. And yet he still finished second.

That's because the final lap wasn’t decided by speed alone. 

It was decided by positioning. 

Four years earlier, Rosenqvist learned that lesson the hard way at Indy. On the final lap, he touched the brakes.

That move instantly killed his momentum and resulted in a fourth place finish. He never forgot it. 

So in 2026, when the final lap began with Rosenqvist sitting in third, he made a commitment to himself: Don’t touch the brakes. Stay flat on the high line. 

At Indianapolis, that phrase means keeping the accelerator fully pressed while driving the outside lane inches from the wall through the turns.

Most drivers lift off the throttle, even slightly, to maintain control.

This time, Rosenqvist didn’t. 

He stayed fully committed to the high line for the entire final lap. That allowed him to carry maximum momentum while positioning himself perfectly in Malukas’s draft coming out of Turn 4. 

And Turn 4 was everything. That was the setup.

That was where positioning became opportunity. 

At 230 MPH, the lead car punches a hole in the air which enables the trailing car to increase speed due to less air resistance fighting against it.

This "drafting" effectively allows a car to make a maneuver and use that increased speed to "slingshot" around their opponent. 

But Rosenqvist's slingshot moment at the finish line only occurred because he positioned himself correctly before entering the front straight. He didn’t pass Malukas because he had the faster car.

He passed him because he was aligned to win when the moment arrived. 

Most businesses underestimate the power of positioning.

They treat it like just another branding term or marketing exercise when in reality it's a strategic growth decision. 

But there’s a difference between understanding positioning and actually being positioned when opportunity appears. The best company doesn’t always win.

Neither does the biggest budget, the most aggressive marketing, or the brand with the highest visibility. Just ask Kodak. Or BlackBerry. 

Over the life of every business, there are multiple Turn 4 moments.

Moments when pressure rises, margins tighten, competition closes in, and positioning determines who enters the front straight with momentum in their favor. 

Positioning depends on Growth Quality.

Not how impressive the company looks in quarterly financials or favorable market conditions. But whether the business is aligned to carry momentum when a slingshot moment arrives. 

Malukas had the speed. Rosenqvist had the positioning...and a lesson learned from failure that gave him the conviction to execute something others wouldn’t attempt. 

It was a strategy that paid off. In less than the blink of an eye.