Oilpressure

If Saturday’s Race One of the Hy-Vee Milwaukee Mile 250s was fun, Sunday’s Race Two was downright crazy! I would say it was that way from the start, but it was actually that way before the start. Before the field could complete a single parade lap, I looked up at a video board in Turn One to see Alex Palou out of harm’s way of the rest of the field. From what I understand (you never hear what happened down in the pits), his battery had died.

After a failed fix, they pushed his car behind the pit wall and back to the Ganassi garage. Where they found the problem and changed the battery. I happened to be standing near Turn One and got a couple of photos as they wheeled the car back out.

He rejoined the race 298 laps down. To make matters worse for Palou, his closest pursuer in the championship, Will Power, took the lead on Lap 44. At that point, Power was leading the championship in the Points as they Run graphics that was flashed up on the video boards.

In the middle of all this, the start got delayed as they were working on Palou’s car. After the normal number of Parade and Pace laps, they finally began to count the laps, even though they were still under caution. They finally attempted a start, but it was mysteriously waved off. Some of the skeptics in the pits were predicting it would be waved off as the field was still on the backstretch, in order to minimize the damage to Palou’s championship. I scoffed to myself when I heard that, but sure enough – it was waved off. The explanation was that the back of the field was misaligned.

They probably should have let it go. Pole-sitter Josef Newgarden slowed down. Marcus Armstrong had pulled out of line to make a move before it was waved off. Unfortunately, Linus Lundqvist plowed into Armstrong and he somehow got twisted around and ran into the side of Newgarden. Two cars were taken out, but Lundqvist was able to continue – but not before having to serve a drive-through penalty for avoidable contact.

One would think that Will Power was going to pounce on the chance to snatch the lead from Palou. It looked as if, Palou was headed for a last-place finish at one point, and that Power might at least earn a podium finish. But on Lap 131, Power spun in Turn Four on a restart. He barely brushed the nose of his car against the outside wall, but he pitted twice – once for tires and again to change the nose during the caution he had brought out. Any chance for the win or even a decent finish was gone. Power finished tenth, while Palou finished nineteenth.

The chaos didn’t stop there. Christian Rasmussen tagged Graham Rahal from behind in Turn Three on Lap 125 – shortly after a restart. Rahal was none too pleased with the young rookie, but Rasmussen probably did him a favor. It put an exclamation point on a horrible weekend for Rahal and his entire team. One person around me remarked that Rahal will probably go faster getting out of Milwaukee, than his car ran all weekend.

Sting Ray Robb, Linus Lundqvist and David Malukas all found their way into the wall at Milwaukee at various times. All in all, it was a very chaotic day.

Did I mention that Scott McLaughlin won the race? He led the most laps (85) and the last 32 laps of the race. One of Saturday’s heroes, Conor Daly, did not have the same success as yesterday. After standing on the podium less than 24 hours earlier, he finished a forgettable seventeenth. He spent a lot of time in the pits in the second half of the race, and eventually retired on Lap 230.

But the other hero from Saturday, Santino Ferrucci, put on another show. After starting twelfth, he immediately jumped up to eighth, then seventh. Every time I looked up early on, he was picking off another position. He led six laps on pit stop shuffles, but it seems he had a third or fourth place car. For the second race in two days, Ferrucci put together another fourth place finish, to go with the one he got yesterday. During driver introductions, the only driver that got a louder ovation than Ferrucci was last night’s winner, Pato O’Ward. Unfortunately for O’Ward, he went out with mechanical issues on Lap 163.

This was a fun weekend and it was a great weekend to cover two very enjoyable races. Race One was fun, and Race Two was crazy. But they were both very entertaining. IndyCar and Firestone have combined to create three excellent oval races in a row, after the not-so-stellar races at Iowa. It really makes me look forward to what Nashville Superspeedway may offer, with Will Power trailing Alex Palou by only 33 points.

That will do it for us this weekend. After a bit of controversy for us ton Thursday to start the weekend, it ended up being a very enjoyable race weekend. The weather was great, the food was good, we loved the track and both races were very enjoyable. If you are on the fence about ever attending an IndyCar race at The Milwaukee Mile, we highly recommend it.

As usual, I will close with some of the photos that Susan took at today’s Race Two. We will be driving back home tomorrow, but I will have my usual Random Thoughts post here on Monday. Thanks to everyone who followed along throughout the weekend. It was a blast.

George Phillips

This entry was posted on September 1, 2024 at 5:47 pm and is filed under IndyCar. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.