Morning Warm-Up: Belle Isle 2019 Race Two

Josef Newgarden will look to become the second driver to sweep the Belle Isle doubleheader

Josef Newgarden won yesterday's race and it reclaimed the championship led for the Tennessean. It was Newgarden's fourth podium finish of the season and his sixth top five finish in seven races. Last year, Newgarden had only three podium finishes. Yesterday was Newgarden's tenth consecutive lead laps finish. Entering this weekend, Newgarden had never had more than nine consecutive lead lap finishes in his IndyCar career. The first streak was from the second Toronto race in 2014 through Barber 2015. The next streak was in 2016 from Phoenix through Iowa. He had nine consecutive lead lap finishes from the 2017 season finale at Sonoma through the second Belle Isle race last year. He will be looking for consecutive finishes for the second time in his career. The only other time he did it was at Toronto and Mid-Ohio in 2017. An American driver has won four of the last five Belle Isle races after an American driver had not won any of the prior 16 races at the track.

Alexander Rossi was runner-up to Newgarden, just over eight-tenths of a second off the Penske driver in race one and that result keeps Rossi third in the championship but he is goes from 21 points off the championship leader to 33 points back of Newgarden heading into race two. It was Rossi's third podium finish in the last four races and his second consecutive runner-up finish. Thirteen times in IndyCar history has a driver had three consecutive runner-up finisher with the most recent occurrence being in 2008 with Hélio Castroneves finishing second at Mid-Ohio, Edmonton and Kentucky.

Takuma Sato has finished third in the last two races and for the first time in Sato's IndyCar career he has three podium finishes in one IndyCar season. Sato has never had three consecutive top five finishes in his IndyCar career. Sato has three top five finishes in his last four Belle Isle starts. Despite Sato's results, his only top five starting position this season was his pole position at Barber. Felix Rosenqvist picked up his second top five finish of the season in race one and that has put Rosenqvist as the top rookie in the championship entering Sunday's race. Rosenqvist's fourth place finish was the first time he has finished ahead of Scott Dixon this season. 

Ryan Hunter-Reay got his third top five finish of the season in race on and Hunter-Reay is attempting to make his 200th consecutive start today. The last IndyCar race to take place that did not feature Hunter-Reay was July 15, 2007 at Nashville Superspeedway. Scott Dixon won that race after leading 105 of laps with Dario Franchitti finishing second and Danica Patrick in third. That race was postponed a day due to rain. During this streak, Hunter-Reay has driven for Rahal Letterman Racing, Vision Racing, A.J. Foyt Racing and Andretti Autosport. He has made 158 starts with Andretti Autosport, 23 with RLR, 12 with Foyt and six with Vision Racing. His last 137 starts have come with Andretti Autosport. 

Simon Pagenaud dropped to second in the championship after finishing sixth in race one. The Frenchman is now 25 points behind Newgarden in the championship. Pagenaud has six top ten finishes from the first seven races, the most top ten finishes through the first seven races of a season he has had in his IndyCar career.  Graham Rahal finished seventh in race one and it was Rahal's ninth top ten finish in 15 Belle Isle starts. It was also the first time this season Rahal has finished a race where he teammate has started ahead of him. He had retired at Barber and last week at Indianapolis, both races Sato started ahead of him. Zach Veach got his first top ten finish of the season with an eighth place finish. Veach matched his career best starting position on a street course in race one when he qualified seventh, though he spun on the final pace lap and ended up taking the green flag from the rear of the field

James Hinchcliffe got his fourth top ten finish in 12 Belle Isle starts after finishing ninth in race one. Hinchcliffe has started in the top ten in five consecutive Belle Isle races and in nine of the last ten races. Hinchcliffe is still looking for his first top ten finish of the season. In Hinchcliffe's first eight seasons he had at least one top five finish within the first seven races. Spencer Pigot finished tenth in race one and it was the third consecutive year Pigot has finished tenth in the Saturday Belle Isle race. He has never finished better than tenth at Belle Isle and he has never started better than 12th at the track.

Sébastien Bourdais has now finished outside the top ten in seven consecutive street course races after he finished 11th in race one. Bourdais has started outside the top fifteen in three consecutive Belle Isle races and outside the top ten in five consecutive races at this track. Colton Herta ended his streak of retirements at four races after he finished 12th in race one and after losing championship positions in the last four races, Herta reversed that and picked up two championship positions going from 16th to 14th after Saturday. Marcus Ericsson was 13th in his first Belle Isle race. Ericsson has finished behind Hinchcliffe in the first seven races this season.

Patricio O'Ward and Tony Kanaan rounded out the top fifteen in race one. Since finishing ninth and eighth in his first two IndyCar starts, O'Ward's average finish is 15.25 in his last four starts. Kanaan started 21st in race one, his fifth time starting outside the top twenty this season and it was his fifth consecutive Belle Isle race starting 15th or worse. Marco Andretti was 16th in race one after he started 18th. Andretti has been the worst starting Andretti Autosport car in four of seven races but he has been the worst finishing Andretti Autosport car in only two races this season with Saturday's race being the second time. The other time was when he finished 14th at Barber. Veach has been the bottom Andretti driver in three races, while Hunter-Reay and Rossi has each taken the team's wooden spoon once. Max Chilton finished 17th yesterday and it was the fifth time he has finished outside the top fifteen this season. Chilton has yet to be the top Carlin qualifier this season with his only top fifteen start this season being 13th at Austin.

Will Power's loose wheel after his only pit stop in race one dropped him to an 18th place finish. Power has ten top ten finishes in 15 Belle Isle starts but yesterday was his third time finishing 18th at Belle Isle and his other two results were 20th. Only once has Power finished outside the top ten in consecutive Belle Isle races. He was 18th in the second race in 2015 and 20th in the first race in 2016. Power started 12th yesterday and that ended a streak of 33 consecutive races starting in the top ten. Santino Ferrucci had to conserve fuel late in Saturday's race and it led to him being the final lead lap finisher in 19th. Ferrucci turned 21 year old on Friday. If he were to win today he would become the sixth youngest winner in IndyCar history. Ed Jones and Matheus Leist each got into the turn seven tires yesterday. Jones was able to continue but he finished a lap down in 20th. Leist retired after completing only 30 of 43 laps. Despite Leist starting ahead of his teammate Kanaan in five of seven races, Kanaan has been the top Foyt finisher in five of seven race.

Scott Dixon's 22nd place finish on Saturday was his first finish outside the top twenty since he finished 32nd in the 2017 Indianapolis 500 and it was his first result outside the top twenty on a road or street course since Mid-Ohio 2016. This is the first time Dixon has finished outside the top fifteen in consecutive races since the 2014 Houston doubleheader when he finished 19th and 18th in those two races.

Qualifying will be broadcasted live on NBCSN at 10:30 a.m. ET.

Group one in today's qualifying session will have Rossi, Dixon, Rahal, Pigot, Pagenaud, Ericsson, Herta, Sato, O'Ward, Chilton and Kanaan. Group two will feature Newgarden, Power, Hunter-Reay, Hinchcliffe, Jones, Veach, Bourdais, Rosenqvist, Ferrucci, Leist and Andretti. The fastest time will win pole position and the group that has the pole-sitter will set the odd-numbered positions on the grid with the other group taking the even-numbered positions.

NBC's coverage of the second race of the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix begins at 3:00 p.m. ET with green flag scheduled for 3:50 p.m. ET. The race is scheduled for 70 laps.