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| Scott Dixon returns to his Buckeye State backyard |
The NTT IndyCar Series returns to Mid-Ohio for the first race of the Honda 200 doubleheader weekend later this afternoon. Championship leader Scott Dixon welcomes the return to the Buckeye State, as Dixon is the all-time leader with six Mid-Ohio victories.
Josef Newgarden has started in the top five in the last six Mid-Ohio races but in that time he has only two top five finishes and three top ten finishes. He won the 2017 race and was fourth in 2018. Last year, Newgarden was running fourth and made an attempt for third on Ryan Hunter-Reay in the keyhole, only to spin into the gravel, dropping him to a 14th place result. The only time Josef Newgarden has won consecutive races in his career was in 2017 when he won at Toronto and followed it up with a victory at Mid-Ohio. Newgarden did enter Mid-Ohio last year off the heels of an Iowa victory.
Patricio O'Ward swept the Indy Lights races at Mid-Ohio in 2018, the last time he raced at the track. This will be O'Ward's 18th start. The most recent driver to score a first career victory in an 18th career start was Ryan Hunter-Reay at Surfers Paradise in 2003. The other three drivers to pick up a first career victory in an 18th career start are Peter DePaolo, Rodger Ward and Paul Tracy.
Takuma Sato has seven top ten finishes in his last eight starts. Sato's most top ten finishes in a season is eight in 2018 and he has had at least seven top ten finishes in the last four seasons. He has two top five finishes this year and he has had four top five finishes the last three seasons. He has finished outside the top ten in seven of ten Mid-Ohio starts.
Colton Herta had three top five finish over the entire 2019 season and with five races remaining in 2020 he already has four top five finishes. Herta's trend of matching his finishes in doubleheader weekends was snapped at Gateway when he finished fourth and then sixth. Herta was running fourth in the second race when he went high in turns three and four after Rinus VeeKay took the air off Herta's front wing when passing Herta for fourth.
Simon Pagenaud is on pace for his worst career average starting position in a full season. Through nine races, he is averaging a 17.111 starting position. He has started outside the top fifteen in the five of nine races. He has started 20th, 17th and 22nd in the three road course races this season. His previous worst average starting position in a full season was 11.6 in 2013. Pagenaud has eight consecutive top ten finishes at Mid-Ohio, half of those are podium finishes with his most recent trip to the podium being his victory in 2016.
Graham Rahal is coming off finishes of 18th and 20th at Gateway two weeks ago. Last year, Rahal had consecutive finishes outside the top fifteen with finishes of 18th at Gateway and 23rd at Portland after contact in turn one. He has six consecutive top ten finishes at Mid-Ohio after having four finishes outside the top fifteen in his first six Mid-Ohio starts.
Will Power's average finish of 5.2 at Mid-Ohio is his best at a track among drivers with at least three starts and without a victory. The only other track Power has at least three starts, does not have a victory but averages a top ten finish is Phoenix, where Power had an average finish of 9.0 after a third, second and 22nd in three starts. Power's next best track without a victory after Phoenix is Iowa where his average finish is 11.5. A pole position today would be the 60th of Power's career, making him only the second driver to reach that milestone. It would also be his fifth Mid-Ohio pole position, and his third track with at least five pole position. Power has seven St. Petersburg pole position and five at Sonoma.
Santino Ferrucci has finished in the top ten in all three road course races this season. Last year, Ferrucci had three top ten finishes in 12 road and street course starts. Last year, Ferrucci started 14th and finished 12th in his Mid-Ohio debut. He matched his career-best starting position of sixth earlier this year in the first Road America race.
Felix Rosenqvist has finished in the top ten of the last two races after having only one top ten finish in the first seven races and Rosenqvist finds himself tenth in the championship. The only time he has finished in the top ten for three consecutive races was at Barber, Long Beach and the Grand Prix of Indianapolis last year. Rosenqvist's first podium finish came last year at Mid-Ohio in a Ganassi 1-2 finish with Dixon.
Ryan Hunter-Reay has not started worse than 12th this year and he has started in the top five on four occasions. The only time Hunter-Reay has finished better than his starting position this season was in both Gateway races. He went from eighth to seventh in race one and 12th to 11th in race two.
Marcus Ericsson completed two laps last year at Mid-Ohio after contact with Takuma Sato and then-Schmidt Peterson Motorsports teammate James Hinchcliffe at the start. Ericsson's best start on a road course this season was 13th in the first Road America race.
Jack Harvey has finished on the lead lap in seven of nine races this season. He had seven lead lap finishes in ten starts last year. He is averaging a 9.0 starting position this season, behind only Newgarden, Power, Hunter-Reay, Herta and Dixon.
Rinus VeeKay has finished on the podium in every one of his starts at Mid-Ohio. VeeKay was third and second at the track in U.S. F2000 in 2017, he swept the Pro Mazda races in 2018 and he was third in both Indy Lights races last year.
Mid-Ohio is one of Conor Daly's better racetracks. Of the tracks where Daly has made at least three starts, his average finish is 12.7 and he has two top ten finishes in three starts. Ed Carpenter Racing has only one top five finish at Mid-Ohio when Josef Newgarden finished fifth after starting on pole position in 2015, when the team was under the CFH Racing banner.
Álex Palou made his first laps in an IndyCar at Mid-Ohio last year for Dale Coyne Racing, turning 102 laps. Palou shared that test day with IMSA champion Felipe Nasr, who drove for Schmidt Peterson Motorsports. Palou's average finish over the last five races is 16th, exactly where he is placed in the championship.
Like his Arrow McLaren SP teammate, Oliver Askew swept the Indy Lights races at Mid-Ohio in 2019. However, only one driver has won at Mid-Ohio in IndyCar and Indy Lights. Paul Tracy won the 1990 Indy Lights race at Mid-Ohio and the 2003 CART race. The only driver to win an Atlantics race and IndyCar race at Mid-Ohio was Patrick Carpentier, who won in Atlantics in 1996 and CART in 2002.
Alexander Rossi's championship will likely end at Mid-Ohio. Rossi enters 262 points behind Scott Dixon. He has been in the top ten of the championship after only one race this season. His fewest races in the top ten of the championship of a season was six in his rookie year four years ago. He ended 11th in the championship as a rookie, the worst championship finish of his career. Prior to this season he had been in the top five of the championship for 34 consecutive races.
Charlie Kimball has finished outside the top ten in three of his last four Mid-Ohio starts. Kimball has not led at the track since his 2013 victory, but in seven starts he has completed 621 of 625 laps and he has been running at the finish of all seven starts.
After finishing tenth on his Mid-Ohio debut two years ago, Zach Veach was 21st last year. In five Indy Lights starts at the track, Veach was in the top five in all of them but the only time he was on the podium was the second race in 2014.
Marco Andretti has been outside the top twenty in the championship for the last six races and after seven of the last eight races. Prior to this streak, he had only been outside the top twenty of the championship once in his career. That was in 201,4 when he finished 22nd at the St. Petersburg season opener after getting into an accident with 28 laps to go. Andretti would recover and finish ninth in the championship that season but got as high as fifth for four races.
Max Chilton's top ten drought is up to 34 races. In four Mid-Ohio starts, Chilton's best finish is 15th despite completed 357 of 360 laps in his four starts. This will be Chilton's 67th start. The only driver to score a first career victory in the 67th start of a career was Maurício Gugelmíin on August 31, 1997 at Vancouver.
Dalton Kellett made 17 starts at Mid-Ohio across the Road to Indy series. Kellett had one podium finish, a third in the first Indy Lights race in 2018 and his only other top five finish at the track was fifth in the second Indy Lights race in 2018.
IndyCar will practice at 10:45 a.m. ET for 75 minutes. Qualifying will take place at 2:00 p.m. ET.
NBCSN's coverage of Honda Indy 200 race one will begin at 4:30 p.m. ET with green flag scheduled for 4:50 p.m. ET. The race is scheduled for 75 laps.
