Milwaukee IndyFest goes down smoothly, drama-free for IndyCar

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Something weird happened at the IZOD IndyCar Series’ weekend at The Milwaukee Mile. It was just a pure race that went down as smooth as a cold Spotted Cow.

IndyCar is in a mad stretch of six races in five weekends. The Indianapolis 500 kicked it off, followed by the doubleheader in Detroit, the lone 1.5-miler this year in Texas, the lone one-miler in Milwaukee this weekend and next week, the 0.875-miler in Iowa.

Indy has the month-long hoopla before the race. Detroit featured something new with the doubleheader concept and a press conference discussing the “infamous aero kits.” Texas was, by most accounts including this author’s, disappointing compared to the package showcased in 2012 and, in the eyes of some, a wasted opportunity for a prime-time network broadcast.

So with this weekend’s race in Milwaukee featuring no extra drama, no sidebar press conferences or tweets and none of the drivers bitching about anything except traffic – which you’d expect given its history and tight quarters – it was a refreshing tonic from the usual madness that often comes as a side dish on an IndyCar weekend.

“To me it was typical Milwaukee. It’s all about traffic,” said Michael Andretti, event promoter and winning car owner for Ryan Hunter-Reay. “Without traffic you normally don’t have passing here. That’s been since when I started racing here. That’s what makes it exciting, is having a car that works in traffic. That’s what won the race, to be honest with you.”

“Well, certainly Milwaukee Mile always gave a fantastic race,” said runner-up and IndyCar points leader Helio Castroneves. “I don’t remember a time that there was a very difficult one. Probably a long time ago in CART times, Champ Car times.

“Right now I feel on the one-mile oval, but also the one-and-a-half-mile oval, we have a good package. We still remember like the side-by-side and things like that. Before side-by-side, it was this style of racing. I think it’s even more fun.”

“If the fans knew how hard we were having to push, they did a good job with televising it, telling the story, catching all the passes in the middle of the pack, it would look like a great race,” added his Team Penske teammate Will Power.

“I just think, like Helio said, when we used to go to Texas, it was pack racing, the leader would stay on the white line, wide open, there would be guys right behind him wide open and never pass. Is that talent?  No. Your grandma could jump in and do it.”

From an on-the-ground perspective, you can tell the effort Andretti’s Andretti Sports Marketing group has put into this race, now having had a full year to promote the event as opposed to the last-minute assembling of the 2012 race (race in June, announced in February).

A packed infield provides a ton of options for families. The racing is close and captivating from the grandstands, and translated well thanks to the broadcast effort by the entire NBC Sports Network team.

As Andretti said afterwards, those who took the weather forecast as gospel earlier in the week missed out.

“The last few days definitely hurt us with the forecast. It was a real shame because in the end, look at the sun shining,” he said. “I’m thinking it kept some people home and they’re going to be sorry they were home because it was such a great event.”

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IndyCar results, points after Detroit Grand Prix

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DETROIT — Alex Palou topped the results of an NTT IndyCar Series race for the second time this season, extending his championship points lead with his victory in the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix.

The Chip Ganassi Racing driver, who also won the GMR Grand Prix (and the Indy 500 pole position) last month, holds a 51-point lead over teammate Marcus Ericsson (ninth at Detroit) through seven of 17 races this season.

Ganassi, which placed all four of its drivers in the top 10 at Detroit, has three of the top four in the championship standings with Scott Dixon ranked fourth after a fourth at Detroit.

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Indy 500 winner Josef Newgarden is third in the standings after taking a 10th at Detroit. Pato O’Ward slipped to fifth in the points after crashing and finishing 26th

Here are the IndyCar results and points standings after the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix:


RESULTS

Click here for the official box score from the 100-lap race on a nine-turn, 1.645-mile street course in downtown Detroit.

Lap leader summary

Full lap chart

Best section times

Full section data

Event summary

Pit stop summary

Here is the finishing order in the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix with starting position in parentheses, driver, engine, laps completed and reason out (if any):

1. (1) Alex Palou, Honda, 100, Running
2. (7) Will Power, Chevrolet, 100, Running
3. (9) Felix Rosenqvist, Chevrolet, 100, Running
4. (4) Scott Dixon, Honda, 100, Running
5. (13) Alexander Rossi, Chevrolet, 100, Running
6. (12) Kyle Kirkwood, Honda, 100, Running
7. (2) Scott McLaughlin, Chevrolet, 100, Running
8. (11) Marcus Armstrong, Honda, 100, Running
9. (6) Marcus Ericsson, Honda, 100, Running
10. (5) Josef Newgarden, Chevrolet, 100, Running
11. (24) Colton Herta, Honda, 100, Running
12. (17) Devlin DeFrancesco, Honda, 100, Running
13. (8) Simon Pagenaud, Honda, 100, Running
14. (20) Agustin Canapino, Chevrolet, 100, Running
15. (15) Conor Daly, Chevrolet, 100, Running
16. (18) Christian Lundgaard, Honda, 100, Running
17. (25) Jack Harvey, Honda, 100, Running
18. (14) Rinus VeeKay, Chevrolet, 100, Running
19. (23) Helio Castroneves, Honda, 100, Running
20. (19) Benjamin Pedersen, Chevrolet, 97, Running
21. (22) Santino Ferrucci, Chevrolet, 97, Running
22. (26) Sting Ray Robb, Honda, 97, Running
23. (21) David Malukas, Honda, 85, Contact
24. (3) Romain Grosjean, Honda, 80, Contact
25. (27) Graham Rahal, Honda, 50, Contact
26. (10) Pato O’Ward, Chevrolet, 41, Contact
27. (16) Callum Ilott, Chevrolet, 1, Contact

Winner’s average speed: 80.922 mph; Time of Race: 02:01:58.1171; Margin of victory: 1.1843 seconds; Cautions: 7 for 32 laps; Lead changes: 10 among seven drivers. Lap Leaders: Palou 1-28; Power 29-33; O’Ward 34; Palou 35-55; Power 56-64; Palou 65; Rossi 66; Newgarden 67-68; Kirkwood 69; Ericsson 70-76; Palou 77-100.


POINTS

Click here for the points tally in the race.

Here are the points standings after the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix:

Drivers

Entrants

Engine manufacturers

Pit stop performance

Top 10 in points: Palou 273, Ericsson 222, Newgarden 203, Dixon 194, O’Ward 191, Rossi 176, McLaughlin 175, Power 172, Herta 149, Rosenqvist 148.

Rest of the standings: Grosjean 145, Kirkwood 142, Lundgaard 136, Ilott 116, VeeKay 108, Ferrucci 105, Armstrong 101, Rahal 99, Malukas 91, Daly 88, DeFrancesco 81, Castroneves 80, Harvey 78, Canapino 77, Pagenaud 72, Pedersen 61, Robb 55, Takuma Sato 37, Ed Carpenter 27, Ryan Hunter-Reay 20, Tony Kanaan 18, Marco Andretti 13, RC Enerson 5, Katherine Legge 5.

Next race: IndyCar will head to Road America for the Sonsio Grand Prix, which will take place June 18 with coverage starting at 1 p.m. ET on NBC and Peacock.