Newgarden laments missed win, podium in Iowa while Pigot, Sato shine - MotorSportsTalk

Josef Newgarden appeared to be headed toward his second dominant victory at Iowa Speedway in three years. He utterly decimated the field in the 2016 Iowa Corn Indy 300, leading all but 18 laps, and the 2018 iteration appeared to going in a similar direction.

Newgarden took the lead from Team Penske teammate Will Power on Lap 24, and he set sail from there, leading 229 laps and lapping the field all the way up to the top five in his No. 1 Hitachi Chevrolet.

However, Schmidt Peterson Motorsports’ James Hinchcliffe had been stalking him through the second half of the race, and used traffic to close on Newgarden’s gearbox with less than 50 laps remaining.

And when Newgarden had trouble lapping Power, Hinchcliffe pounced, slicing his No. 5 Arrow Electronics Honda to inside with 45 laps to go.

.@Hinchtown is our NEW LEADER! 45 laps to go! pic.twitter.com/MvR6oo3qJJ

— IndyCar on NBC (@IndyCaronNBC) July 8, 2018

Newgarden then faded to over eight seconds behind Hinchcliffe, but a late yellow for a spinning Ed Carpenter appeared to give him new life as it erased Hinchcliffe’s lead and gave Newgarden and Penske a chance to pit for fresh tires, which they elected to do.

However, with only five laps remaining, there was simply not enough time to run through the yellow procedure before the race concluded, and Newgarden never got a chance to race under green with the new tires.

The circumstances saw Hinchcliffe take the win, while Newgarden ended up fourth, the extra stop ultimately costing him a podium – he had been running second prior to pitting.

Though disappointed, Newgarden was gracious in defeat.

“This is IndyCar racing. You have to expect the unexpected,” he explained. “It’s never sorted out and locked up right at the beginning. We had a great No. 1 Hitachi Chevrolet and for the first half of the race, we had the car to beat. And it just fell away from us. Sometimes you can’t predict exactly what you’re going to need at the end of these things.Today, we didn’t have exactly what it was that we needed but we’ll come back and try it again. I think Hinch (James Hinchcliffe) did a great job. Congrats to him and Schmidt Peterson Motorsports.”

Robert Wickens and his No. 7 Lucas Oil Honda for SPM also pulled the same strategy as Newgarden and pitted under the late yellow. And like Newgarden, the move cost them a podium – Wickens had been running third at the time, but ended up finishing fifth.

Robert Wickens saw a podium finish slip away due to a late call to pit under yellow. Photo: IndyCar

But, like Newgarden, Wickens was gracious afterward and highlighted that it remained a strong outing for SPM.

“In the end, it’s a great day, great day for Honda, great day for Schmidt Peterson Motorsports. Two cars in the top five. It should have been a double podium and there would have been nothing sweeter than to celebrate Hinch’s (James Hinchcliffe) win than being on the podium with him,” Wickens revealed.

Pigot, Sato Inherit First Podiums of 2018

The mistimed pit stops for Newgarden and Wickens opened the door for Spencer Pigot and Takuma Sato to grab their first podium finishes of the 2018 Verizon IndyCar Series season.

And while luck certainly played a role in netting them second (Pigot) and third (Sato), their runs to the front were completely on merit.

Pigot had arguably the drive of the day. After qualifying a lowly 18th, the Ed Carpenter Racing driver methodically moved his No. 20 Fuzzy’s Vodka Chevrolet forward and ran inside the top three in the second half of the race.

Similarly, Sato quietly worked his way forward after starting tenth to run inside the top five in the final 100 laps.

Both drivers ran fourth and fifth in the waning laps prior to the late yellow, and moved up to second and third when Newgarden and Wickens pitted.

And both were happy to inherit their places on the podium to cap off their best days of the season.

“It was a tough race out there,” Pigot said afterward. “Right from the get-go, I knew that we had a fast car the way we were able to pass some people through the beginning of the race, and then as the stint went on, I just thought we got kind of stronger and stronger and was really able to close down and pass people. Yeah, I mean, I can’t thank the guys enough. We made a few changes from qualifying yesterday. Obviously that was a little disappointing, but we kept our heads down, and the guys in pit lane did a great job and executed really well.”

Spencer Pigot scored his first career podium in finishing second in the Iowa Corn Indy 300. Photo: IndyCar

For Pigot, the result is a much needed shot in the arm after troublesome start saw him fail to score a top 10 until Race 1 of the Chevrolet Dual in Detroit (he finished 10th).

On the heels of an eighth place at the KOHLER Grand Prix at Road America, Pigot now has back-to-back top 10s.

“We’ve had a season that I think we could have executed a little bit better at times, but today everything went right, and we found ourselves on the podium, so it’s definitely a great feeling,” he added.

For Sato, the third-place result is his first podium since re-joining Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing this year, and is his second top five in a row – he finished fourth at Road America. Further, it comes on a weekend in which they struggled initially – Sato was 16th fastest after first practice – and rebounded to get a strong result.

Takuma Sato scored his first podium finish of 2018 at Iowa Speedway. Photo: IndyCar

“I think we put on a really good race, and me particularly, obviously very happy to be on the podium, but this was a great achievement from Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing because obviously I didn’t think we had a podium finish car after the first practice session where Graham and I finished, I don’t know, 17th, 19, things like that. We kept that last week. We really struggled, but I think all the engineering did a fantastic job moving up over the session, and in the end I think we pulled a really great car. So big thank you to the whole team, and the No. 30 car was fantastic today,” Sato said afterward.

The results moved Newgarden up to second in the championship, while Wickens sits sixth, Sato 12th, and Pigot 14th.

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INDIANAPOLIS – Alex Palou had not turned a wheel wrong the entire Month of May at the Indy 500 until Rinus VeeKay turned a wheel into the Chip Ganassi Racing pole-sitter leaving pit road on Lap 94.

“There is nothing I could have done there,” Palou told NBC Sports. “It’s OK, when it is my fault or the team’s fault because everybody makes mistakes. But when there is nothing, you could have done differently there, it feels bad and feels bad for the team.”

Marcus Ericsson was a master at utilizing the “Tail of the Dragon” move that breaks the draft of the car behind him in the closing laps to win last year’s Indianapolis 500. On Sunday, however, the last of three red flags in the final 16 laps of the race had the popular driver from Sweden breathing fire after Team Penske’s Josef Newgarden beat him at his own game on the final lap to win the Indianapolis 500.

Despite the two disappointments, team owner Chip Ganassi was seen on pit road fist-bumping a member on his four-car team in this year’s Indianapolis 500 after his drivers finished second, fourth, sixth and seventh in the tightly contested race.

Those are pretty good results, but at the Indianapolis 500, there is just one winner and 32 losers.

“There is only one winner, but it was a hell of a show,” three-time Indianapolis 500 winner and Chip Ganassi Racing consultant Dario Franchitti told NBC Sports. “Alex was very fast, and he got absolutely caught out in somebody else’s wreck. There was nothing he could have done, but he and the 10 car, great recovery.

“Great recovery by all four cars because at half distance, we were not looking very good.”

After 92 laps, the first caution flew for Sting Ray Robb of Dale Coyne Racing hitting the Turn 1 wall.

During pit stops on Lap 94, Palou had left his stall when the second-place car driven by VeeKay ran into him, putting Palou’s Honda into the wall. The car sustained a damaged front wing, but the Chip Ganassi crew was able to get him back in the race on the lead lap but in 28^th position.

Palou ultimately would fight his way to a fourth-place finish in a race the popular Spaniard could have won. His displeasure with VeeKay, whom he sarcastically called “a legend” on his team radio after the incident, was evident.

“The benefit of being on pole is you can drive straight and avoid crashes, and he was able to crash us on the side on pit lane, which is pretty tough to do, but he managed it,” Palou told NBC Sports. “Hopefully next year we are not beside him. Hopefully, next year we have a little better luck.”

Palou started on the pole and led 36 laps, just three fewer than race leader Pato O’Ward of Arrow McLaren Racing.

“We started really well, was managing the fuel as we wanted, our car was pretty good,” Palou said. “Our car wasn’t great, we dropped to P4 or P5, but we still had some good stuff.

“On the pit stop, the 21 (VeeKay) managed to clip us. Nothing we could have done there. It was not my team’s fault or my fault.

“We had to drop to the end. I’m happy we made it back to P4. We needed 50 more laps to make it happen, but it could have been a lot worse after that contact.

“I learned a lot, running up front at the beginning and in mid-pack and then the back. I learned a lot.

“It feels amazing when you win it and not so good when things go wrong. We were a bit lucky with so many restarts at the end to make it back to P4 so I’m happy with that.”

Palou said the front wing had to be changed and the toe-in was a bit off, but he still had a fast car.

In fact, his Honda was the best car at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway all month. His pole-winning four lap average speed of 234.217 miles per hour around the 2.5-mile Indianapolis Motor Speedway was a record for this fabled race.

Palou looked good throughout the race, before he had to scratch and claw and race his way back to the top-five after he restarted 28^th.

In the Indianapolis 500, however, the best car doesn’t always win.

“It’s two years in a row that we were leading the race at the beginning and had to drop to last,” Palou said. “Maybe next year, we will start in the middle of the field and go on to win the race.

“I know he didn’t do it on purpose. It’s better to let that pass someday.”

Palou said the wild racing at the end was because the downforce package used in Sunday’s race means the drivers have to be aggressive. The front two cars can battle for the victory, but cars back in fourth or fifth place can’t help determine the outcome of the race.

That is when the “Tail of the Dragon” comes into the play.

Franchitti helped celebrate Ericsson’s win in 2022 with his “Tail of the Dragon” zigzag move – something he never had to do in any of his three Indianapolis 500 victories because they all finished under caution.

In 2023, however, IndyCar Race Control wants to make every attempt to finish the race under green, without going past the scheduled distance like NASCAR’s overtime rule.

Instead of extra laps, they stop the race with a red flag, to create a potential green-flag finish condition.

“You do what you have to do to win within the rules, and it’s within the rules, so you do it,” Franchitti said. “The race is 200 laps and there is a balance.

“Marcus did a great job on that restart and so did Josef. It was just the timing of who was where and that was it.

“If you knew it was going to go red, you would have hung back on the lap before.

“Brilliant job by the whole Ganassi organization because it wasn’t looking very good at half-distance.

“Full marks to Josef Newgarden and Team Penske.”

Franchitti is highly impressed by how well Ericsson works with CGR engineer Brad Goldberg and how close this combination came to winning the Indianapolis 500 two-years-in-a-row.

It would have been the first back-to-back Indy 500 winner since Helio Castroneves in 2001 and 2002.

“Oh, he’s a badass,” Franchitti said Ericsson. “He proved it last year. He is so calm all day. What more do you need? As a driver, he’s fast and so calm.”

Ericsson is typically in good spirits and jovial.

He was stern and direct on pit road after the race.

“I did everything right, I did an awesome restart, caught Josef off-guard and pulled away,” Ericsson said on pit lane. “It’s hard to pull away a full lap and he got me back.

“I’m mostly disappointed with the way he ended. I don’t think it was fair and safe to do that restart straight out of the pits on cold tires for everyone.

“To me, it was not a good way to end that race.

“Congrats to Josef. He didn’t do anything wrong. He is a worthy champion, but it shouldn’t have ended like that.”

Palou also didn’t understand the last restart, which was a one-start showdown.

“I know that we want to finish under green,” Palou said. “Maybe the last restart I did, I didn’t understand. It didn’t benefit the CGR team.

“I’m not very supportive of the last one, but anyway.”

Dixon called the red flags “a bit sketchy.”

“The Red Flags have become a theme to the end of the race, but sometimes they can catch you out,” Dixon said. “I know Marcus is frustrated with it.

“All we ask for is consistency. I think they will do better next time.

“It’s a tough race. People will do anything they can to win it and with how these reds fall, you have to be in the right place at the right time. The problem is when they throw a Red or don’t throw a Red dictates how the race will end.

“It’s a bloody hard race to win. Congrats to Josef Newgarden and to Team Penske.”

Follow Bruce Martin on Twitter at @BruceMartin_500