Scott McLaughlin Wins His First Oval
Well, that was very strange. After Friday’s practice, word started going around that we were most likely going to see a parade tonight. The 10% reduction in downforce and the new tire that Firestone brought were not working as expected with the repaving job in the corners, and passing was going to be at a premium. For the first 176 laps, that turned out to be true.
After a lengthy yellow on the opening lap that saw four cars involved and three of them immediately eliminated, once the race went green – the race settled into the single-file procession that we were expecting – with Colton Herta taking the lead from the pole. A tow-in for Graham Rahal on Lap 80, led to a pass for the lead in the pits – when Scott McLaughlin barely nudged ahead of Colton Herta after almost the entire field pitted. On the same sequence of pit stops, Alex Palou stalled his car and had fallen to nineteenth when he finally came out.
At around Lap 165, I saw a friend of mine in the pits. We were talking about what a parade this was. My friend was complaining about all of the penalties being handed down by Race Control. It was at that point when Alex Palou lost the back end of his car and backed into the outside wall along the front straightaway. That one instant on Lap 176, changed the face of the race and possibly the championship.
The naysayers were chattering that Alex Palou was entering the portion of the season where he would not produce the results needed to secure another championship. I maintained that even though Palou has never won on an oval, he wasn’t horrible. His previous results were pretty impressive. Not tonight. After stalling during his pits stop and falling back to nineteenth, Palou worked his way back to twelfth before smacking the wall. He finished twenty-third.
Palou still leads the points by thirty-seven points, but only because Will Power had a bad night also. Power slipped from second to third in points, while Pato O’Ward has climbed his way to second in points by finishing second tonight; after being mired in fifth just a couple of weeks ago.
After such a boring and processional race for 176 laps, things certainly turned interesting. There were three more cautions in the last 74 laps; one for a tow-in for Linus Lundqvist, one for a spin by Colton Herta that cost him several spots and a crash involving Pietro Fittipaldi, Ed Carpenter and Will Power. After leading 86 laps, Herta finished a disappointing eleventh.
Josef Newgarden was by far the biggest mover of the night. After starting twenty-second in a dismal qualifying effort, the two-time defending champion worked his way to finish fourth, benefiting from phenomenal pit work by his crew. In the post-race press conference, he said he knew early on that he had the best car in the field.
Another impressive drive came from Santino Ferrucci. He overcame a stop-and-go penalty for a restart violation when the race finally went green after the initial caution. After dropping to the tail-end from the penalty, Ferrucci finished an impressive sixth.
In the end, it was Scott McLaughlin earning his first career oval win. After the race, he said that he would never consider himself a true IndyCar driver until he had an oval victory. Now he’s got one and he starts on pole tomorrow. Look out!
That’s going to do it for us tonight. It’s after 10:20 pm CDT as I wrap this up. We have to get to our car and drive thirty miles to our hotel, then get up and do this all over again in the morning. Tomorrow’s race broadcast will begin at 11:00 am CDT on Big NBC, and the green flag will fly around 11:30.
Once again, I’ll close with some of Susan’s photos from tonight’s race. Please check back here in the morning.
George Phillips
Oilpressure 
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