Newgarden ends as IndyCar’s top oval driver in 2016

Even though he only was able to complete four of the five oval races in 2016, Josef Newgarden ended as the Verizon IndyCar Series’ top-scoring driver in them this year.

The driver of the No. 21 Fuzzy’s Vodka Chevrolet for Ed Carpenter Racing won in dominant fashion at Iowa Speedway, came third at the double points Indianapolis 500, fourth in Pocono, and sixth in Phoenix.

His accident at Texas Motor Speedway in June, of course, left him with a fractured right clavicle and a slight fracture to his right hand. That threatened to rule him out of action but the determined young American driver made it back in time for the next race at Road America, persevering through to finish eighth. He was not, however, allowed to restart the resumption of the Firestone 600 on Saturday night.

Will Power was second in oval points. The driver of the No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet won at Pocono and added a second at Iowa, third in Phoenix, eighth in Texas and 10th in the Indianapolis 500.

Power, Tony Kanaan and Sebastien Bourdais were the only three drivers who finished in the top-10 in each of the five oval races.

Kanaan tied with Scott Dixon for fourth in oval points after another strong season. Bourdais, not usually a top-10 finisher on ovals, broke that trend this year.

Alexander Rossi, thanks in large part to his win at the Indianapolis 500, ended third in oval points. He also has his second-best finish of the year – sixth at Iowa – on an oval this year. He ran well at the first portion of Texas but lost a couple laps in the resumption; his pit road incident at Pocono, meanwhile, provided one of the year’s scarier moments – albeit one where all parties emerged uninjured.

Of note, Simon Pagenaud was eighth in oval points – and that’s slightly misleading because his only “off race” of the five ovals was Indianapolis, which featured double points. Second at Phoenix, fourth in Iowa and fourth in Texas were three good results; his only mistake came at Pocono, where he crashed at Turn 1.

Further down the order Juan Pablo Montoya had a miserable run of results on ovals; he only outscored Jack Hawksworth, Ed Carpenter and Conor Daly of drivers that competed in all five oval rounds.

And Carpenter’s year behind the wheel? That can be crystallized in one unfortunate stat. Yes, double points were involved, but his teammate JR Hildebrand outscored him competing in just one oval race, with sixth at Indy. Carpenter’s best finish in five races was just 18th.

Points are below. The races, are in order, are 2-Phoenix, 6-Indy 500, 9-Texas (was originally the ninth round of the season before rain-delayed postponement until Saturday), 11-Iowa and 14-Pocono. C is Chevrolet and H is Honda.

Points (Top 25 of 34 drivers):

#	Driver		2	6	(9)	11	14	Total
21	Newgarden	C	28	111	9	53	33	234
12	Power	C	35	73	24	40	51	223
98	Rossi	H	16	124	19	29	11	199
9	Dixon	C	53	69	11	36	29	198
10	Kanaan	C	32	81	36	26	23	198
26	Munoz	H	8	115	28	18	26	195
5	Hinchcliffe	H	12	95	43	22	20	192
22	Pagenaud	C	40	50	32	34	13	169
83	Kimball	C	18	78	28	20	15	159
11	Bourdais	C	24	59	20	24	31	158
15	Rahal	H	30	40	51	14	19	154
3	Castroneves	C	21	65	31	17	11	145
7	Aleshin	H	13	40	14	30	44	141
28	Hunter-Reay	H	20	53	18	8	36	135
27	Andretti	H	17	54	18	16	18	123
8	Chilton	C	26	42	15	12	17	112
2	Montoya	C	23	27	22	10	24	106
41	Hawksworth	H	11	31	13	15	16	86
14	Sato	H	15	32	10	19	8	84
6	Hildebrand	C		76				76
20	Carpenter	C	9	24	13	12	9	67
18	Daly	H	14	20	9	9	14	66
19	Chaves	H		33	16	13		62
77	Servia	H		60				60
29	Bell	H		55				55

Follow @TonyDiZinno