ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – “HertaMania 2.0” is a winner in his first weekend in the Indy Lights Presented by Cooper Tires.
Colton Herta is just 16 years old and turns 17 on March 30, but the son of two-time Indianapolis 500-winning car owner and a star driver in his own right, Bryan Herta, has delivered his first career victory in only his second start in the series, a day after coming second on Saturday to fellow series rookie and Pro Mazda champion Aaron Telitz. Interestingly, Bryan Herta won the 1993 Indy Lights title some seven years before Colton was even born.
The younger Herta started from pole in today’s race at St. Petersburg (airs March 18 on NBCSN) and completed a flag-to-flag victory in the 45-lap, one-hour race, driving the No. 98 Deltro Energy-backed Dallara IL-15 Mazda for Andretti-Steinbrenner Racing, near the Steinbrenner family’s spring home of Tampa.
Herta had to defend against last season’s Indy Lights runner-up Santiago Urrutia in his No. 5 Belardi Auto Racing car, which is sporting Arrow signage on the sidepods this weekend, on the restarts. Urrutia got close a couple times but was never able to make a proper move, Herta largely defending to the inside to keep the lead.
The win today followed a passing exhibition on Saturday where Herta made several successful moves to the inside at Turn 1 to advance from fifth on the grid up to second. This caps off a week where Herta threw the first pitch at George M. Steinbrenner Field on Tuesday for the New York Yankees spring training game and is now two-for-two on podium finishes.
Herta raced in Europe the last two seasons and won a handful of races with the Carlin team, but was excited to return home to racing in North America this year.
Urrutia was second for his first podium of the weekend, rebounding after damage sustained on the first lap yesterday knocked him back to 13th, while Pato O’Ward delivered a sterling drive to third for Team Pelfrey. Kyle Kaiser (Juncos Racing) and Saturday winner Telitz completed the top five.
Media and fan attention focused on a controversial run-in between Haiden Deegan and his Monster Energy Yamaha Star Racing teammate Jordon Smith during Round 10 of the Monster Energy Supercross race at Detroit, after which the 250 East points’ Hunter Lawrence defends the young rider in the postrace news conference.
Deegan took the early lead in Heat 1 of the round, but the mood swiftly changed when he became embroiled in a spirited battle with teammate Smith.
On Lap 3, Smith caught Deegan with a fast pass through the whoops. Smith briefly held the lead heading into a bowl turn but Deegan had the inside line and threw a block pass. In the next few turns, the action heated up until Smith eventually ran into the back of Deegan’s Yamaha and crashed.
One of the highlights of the battle seemed to include a moment when Deegan waited on Smith in order to throw a second block pass, adding fuel to the controversy.
After his initial crash, Smith fell to seventh on the next lap. He would crash twice more during the event, ultimately finishing four laps off the pace in 20th.
The topic was inevitably part of the postrace news conference.
Smith had more trouble in the Last Chance Qualifier. He stalled his bike in heavy traffic, worked his way into a battle for fourth with the checkers in sight, but crashed a few yards shy of the finish line and was credited with seventh. Smith earned zero points and fell to sixth in the standings.
Jordon Smith failed to make the Detroit Supercross Main and fell to sixth in the points. – Feld Motor Sports
“I think he’s like fifth in points,” Deegan said. “He’s a little out of it. Beside that it was good, I don’t know. I wasn’t really paying attention.”
Deegan jokingly deflected an earlier question with the response that he wasn’t paying attention during the incident.
“He’s my teammate, but he’s a veteran, he’s been in this sport for a while,” Deegan said. “I was up there just battling. I want to win as much as everybody else. It doesn’t matter if it’s a heat race or a main; I just want to win. I was just trying to push that.”
As Deegan and Smith battled, Jeremy Martin took the lead. Deegan finished second in the heat and backed up his performance with a solid third-place showing in the main, which was his second podium finish in a short six-race career. Deegan’s first podium was earned at Daytona, just two rounds ago.
But as Deegan struggled to find something meaningful to say, unsurprisingly for a 17-year-old rider who was not scheduled to run the full 250 schedule this year, it was the championship leader Lawrence who came to his defense.
A block pass by Haiden Deegan led to a series of events that eventually led to Jordon Smith failing to make the Main. – Feld Motor Sports
“I just want to point something out, which kind of amazes me,” Lawrence said during the conference. “So many of the people on social media, where everyone puts their expertise in, are saying the racing back in the ’80s, the early 90s, when me were men. They’re always talking about how gnarly it was and then anytime a block pass or something happens now, everyone cries about it.
“That’s just a little bit interesting. Pick one. You want the gnarly block passes from 10 years ago and then you get it, everyone makes a big song and dance about it.”
Pressed further, Lawrence defended not only the pass but the decision-making process that gets employed lap after lap in a Supercross race.
“It’s easy to point the finger,” Lawrence said. “We’re out there making decisions in a split millisecond. People have all month to pay their phone bill and they still can’t do that on time.
“We’re making decisions at such a fast reaction [time with] adrenaline. … I’m not just saying it for me or Haiden. I speak for all the guys. No one is perfect and we’re under a microscope out there. The media is really quick to point a finger when someone makes a mistake.”
The media is required to hold athletes accountable for their actions. They are also required to tell the complete story.
