INDYCAR

Newgarden untouchable in Saturday Iowa 250

He didn’t lap the Top 10 and he only finished a few seconds ahead of his teammate, but there was never, ever a doubt that Saturday night’s Iowa 250 belonged to Josef Newgarden.
In scoring his third career win at Iowa Speedway and becoming the first pole-sitter ever to make it to victory lane there, Newgarden led 214 of 250 laps in his Hitachi Chevy and continued his amazing dominance at this 7/8ths-mile short track.
“It feels really good,” said the 2019 NTT IndyCar champion after notching his first win of 2020. “I don’t know what we’ve got do to keep the bad luck off of us, but hopefully this is a start. Our guys did an amazing job yesterday. I was so disappointed for them because I felt like they had the winning car. They put in the work and we just weren’t able to get rewarded for it. I was so determined to come back today. I think everyone was determined to come back and have a really good race. And we just ran hard.”
Other than pit stops, Newgarden was never passed on the track, although Will Power kept it close most of the 90-degree evening and finished 2.7 seconds behind in the Penske Chevy.
“It felt good. ‘Been nice to have a win, but if you do a good job in this series, you get screwed; so we’ve just got to soldier on,” said the 2018 Indianapolis 500 winner.
Graham Rahal, who lost out on chances at a win at the Indy Grand Prix because of an untimely caution, finally got a good break Saturday night, and that helped propel him from 19th to third in his RLL Honda.
“We needed it. I’m proud of this team and we’re going to be contenders this year,” said the second-generation driver following his second podium finish in this still-young season.
Twenty-four hours after pulling off a last-to-first jaw-dropper in his Menard’s Chevy, Simon Pagenaud again showed his muscle by coming from 23rd to fourth.
“It was a dramatic weekend, but we persevered,” said the 2016 IndyCar champion. “We weren’t quite as hooked up tonight, but a first and a fourth is good for the championship.”
Points leader Scott Dixon hung in there to take fifth in the PNC Honda after starting 18th, and leads Pagenaud by 49 points heading to Mid-Ohio in three weeks.
“I think we knew this weekend was going to be one of our biggest challenges in terms of race weekends,” Dixon said. “We haven’t been as strong at Iowa as we’ve been at other tracks. We worked on it and tried some things and learned a lot, and we were able to work our way up and get a good result for the PNC Bank car.”
Pato O’Ward and Conor Daly both appeared headed for a podium finish before a botched pit stop and untimely yellow flag dropped them to 12th and 14th, respectively. O’Ward (Arrow McLaren SP Chevy) managed to pass Power and put the pressure on Newgarden only to have trouble with his left-rear tire being attached on his final pit stop on Lap 172.

Robin Miller