It was a mixture of the way the strategy worked out and pit stops and the difficult nature of Gateway Motorsports Park but with about 40 laps to go, when Josef Newgarden either couldn't get through Kanaan and Carpenter or Newgarden was settling for fourth with his championship rivals well in his mirrors, it became clear Takuma Sato was going to win this race and that is bonkers!
Sato was lost at the start. He fell to dead last from fifth on the grid. It appeared to be another night from hell. All I can say is Sato kept running and with all the cautions he was able to stay on the lead lap. The cautions fell in a way where Sato and the like could gamble and try and stretch his fuel. Sato was in the correct place. When Sébastien Bourdais skimmed the wall, Sato was the leader and had trapped all but Kanaan, Carpenter and Newgarden a lap down. He had plenty of cushion and with a successful restart that saw him retain the lead, he was gone and after being under a microscope for six days, Sato picks up his second victory of the season.
2. Kudos to Ed Carpenter for giving Sato a run for his money because a margin of victory of 0.0399 seconds did not look likely with ten laps to go. Kanaan didn't have the pace to catch Sato and Carpenter found his legs late. If this race were 249 laps, Carpenter would be claiming his first victory in five years. Not a bad way for Carpenter to end his season.
3. It was nice to see have Tony Kanaan have a good day. This was not like Pocono or Iowa where Kanaan got into the top ten. He struggled a bit. He wasn't terrible but this wasn't a race where Kanaan was starting eighth and staying in the top ten all race. It has been over two years since Kanaan's last top five finish. It is just nice to see him happy. Work has to be done to improve A.J. Foyt Racing but it was nice to see they won a lottery tonight, even if it was only $50 on a scratch off.
4. Santino Ferrucci gets another fourth place finish on an oval. Ferrucci hasn't put a wheel wrong this year and he was the top rookie finisher in all five oval races. He deserves credit and he is in the catbird seat for rookie of the year now. He did make a mistake on the final lap, running wide and coming back down into the racing line, forcing Newgarden to spin. It is a mixture of Ferrucci has been good but he has been fortunate on multiple occasions. We have to revisit Ferrucci's past at a later date because when the going got tough in Europe he snapped. Things are going well now but what driver will he be when he hits a rough patch in IndyCar?
5. Simon Pagenaud is leaving Gateway second in the championship on a night when he really didn't have top five pace. It was odd to see Pagenaud not quite have it but this fifth place finish is a big lift for him and all of a sudden he is Newgarden's closest championship competitor with two races to go.
6. This was the night I expected out of Conor Daly. Carlin has had good cars on ovals. Daly has been good and Charlie Kimball has been good. Daly has had a handled on Gateway since IndyCar first tested at the track in the spring of 2017. I think this was Daly's best race in IndyCar. I got to go back and check because he had some good runs when substituting for James Hinchcliffe four years ago and he led laps in the Grand Prix of Indianapolis and Mid-Ohio driving for Dale Coyne Racing but this race was stout when Daly has nothing guaranteed... other than a ride in the season finale with Andretti Autosport.
7. Josef Newgarden nearly coughed up another load of points like he did at Mid-Ohio. Granted, it appeared this case was not over-aggression from Newgarden but naïveness from Ferrucci forcing an error from Newgarden. I felt like Newgarden and Ferrucci had the best cars tonight but when Newgarden got in traffic he didn't quite have it. In the closing laps he knew he didn't have to win. He knew he was set to increase his championship lead.
I am sure he is ruing losing those points but he leaves Gateway 38 points ahead of Pagenaud, four points more than he had over second entering this race. Even when Newgarden loses he wins. I said I felt Newgarden would put a hand on the Astor Cup at Gateway. Four points isn't a massive championship lead increase but Newgarden has to be feeling confident heading into the final two races.
8. Ryan Hunter-Reay gets an eighth place finish in his 250th start. The Bourdais caution cost him. Hunter-Reay was set on a three-stop strategy but that caution trapped him a lap down. Instead of fight for a top five all he could do was take the wave around and be stuck in the back half of the top ten.
9. Colton Herta gets a ninth place finish; the first time he has finished a race on an oval. I think Herta needed that weight over his shoulders with the oval season concluding.
10. Marco Andretti rounded out the top ten but this was not his strongest night. Andretti was hoping to have a three-stop strategy play into his favor. It was until the final caution but he needs to find oval pace during the offseason.
11. Felix Rosenqvist and James Hinchcliffe were the 11th and 12th place finishers. We need to get to Alexander Rossi...
12. And in 13th was Alexander Rossi. Rossi has to win one of Portland or Laguna Seca. He is not out of it, as he is only 46 points back with two races to go. He could win at Portland, cut the championship lead to 35 points and that is still a favorable margin where he could win Laguna Seca and still be champion if Newgarden finishes fifth but Rossi's two crappy days could not come at the worse time.
Tonight wasn't that bad until the Bourdais caution. Rossi got better and was challenging Newgarden but the Bourdais caution trapped Rossi a lap down. Rossi was a spot behind Newgarden but during that pit cycle Rossi got stuck in traffic. Newgarden not only leapfrogged Rossi but also got out ahead of the traffic and was able to build a ten-second gap over Rossi. Newgarden was on the lead lap when the caution came out. Rossi missed it by the matter of seconds.
Rossi could have stopped and taken fuel but he was in a lose-lose. If he did stop he could make it but he would lose ground to Newgarden. If he didn't stop, which he didn't, he was going to need extreme fuel conservation to make it or make his final stop under green. His final stop came under green and he finished a lap down in 13th.
Hindsight says he should have stopped and even at the time he should have stopped. My only thought is the team didn't want to risk sending him back to restart in 11th but here he finished 13th. If he had restarted 11th he would have at least been on the lead lap and had about 40 laps to climb back up. There was no guarantee he would catch Newgarden but he could have gotten to seventh or eighth and in that case he would not have lost as much ground.
Rossi has not had much go his way the last four races and in none of the last four races has he been the man to beat. It has to be infuriating because he has been within touching distance of the top spot in the championship since basically day one of the season and now, at the 11th hour, he cannot seem to re-gather the magic. The ship has to be righted in Portland otherwise the finale in his home state will be another scramble.
13. Quickly through the rest of the field: Zach Veach is still lost. Charlie Kimball pinched Spencer Pigot. Marcus Ericsson spun twice and didn't hit anything either time. Matheus Leist was in the way. Something broke on Graham Rahal. Sébastien Bourdais had a wonderful night going and he could have been a podium finisher.
14. Oh... because of how batshit crazy tonight was we forgot that Scott Dixon had a radiator puncture hamper his night and Will Power got into the wall all on his own. This has been an uncharacteristically odd season for both drivers. Dixon has had too many things go against him and Power is developing this worrying trend of mistakes when running at the front. This season is either a one-off or a shift in the careers of these drivers. We will only really know in about 2022.
15. We had longer cautions tonight than we have seen in recent IndyCar races and the notable reason was the sweepers. This isn't new and it was much more common I feel a few years ago. I don't know if it is just because there has been less attrition in oval races in recent years or if other ovals do not have as many marbles gather off line but enough people were losing their patience tonight that I think a comment has to be made.
It is trade off. If you want cars to be able to pass at least after a restart than it is going to take five or six more laps for the sweepers to do the necessary job. If you don't want to lose those laps than fine but don't get upset if everyone is single-file on a restart. We can't have it both ways.
I think the marbles were more excessive than the other ovals we have had this year. There is part of me that thinks we don't need to sweep all the time but how do you decide? It is kind of like cleaning the floors in your house. You aren't going to mop every other day but if you start seeing grime build up you are going to take care of it. There is not a right time or schedule and I am not sure it can be regulated. I can't think it would make any sense for IndyCar to limit itself to only bringing out the sweepers once in each half of a race. That could back the series into a corner.
This is just a side effect of trying to make sure the racetrack is conducive to competitive racing.
17. Gateway is not an easy place to pass at and that is fine. I feel like we have done this after each Gateway race. Not every track can have passing every lap, nor sure every race have passing on every lap. We have seen in the last two Gateway races strategy shape what occurs on the racetrack. There is nothing wrong with that but in these cases we do not know what type of race we are going to get until about halfway to 60% of the way through.
Will Power said a second line could form and, of course, Power is the guy who gets into the marbles and into the wall. I kind of wish Gateway was not repaved in the spring of 2017 before IndyCar's return because the older surface would have chewed up tires and drivers would have gravitated to a second line. It was similar to Iowa.
We have to wait probably another two or three years because the surface is worn enough where drivers consider the outside, at least in turns one and two. In the current state, unless there is a ton of rubber it is going to be one groove and IndyCar just doesn't have the time to make sure the track is rubbered up.
IndyCar only had two one-hour practice sessions. Add to it that there was the Indy Pro 2000 race on Cooper Tires, Indy Lights race on Cooper Tires and the NASCAR K&N East and West Series combined race on Goodyear tires all before the IndyCar race tonight and in that case IndyCar has no hope of having a track surface conducive to the Firestone tires.
I wish Firestone supplied the support series tires because then the same compound could be brought for all the series competing and then the track would be at its peak rubber level but that is not the case. I am not sure what IndyCar can do to make sure two grooves are ready to go if not right when the race begins within the first stint of the race. IndyCar has not experiment with traction compounds like NASCAR. A lot of people do not like it but, same with caution lengths, if you are upset there is not enough passing you cannot get upset if IndyCar tries something to make sure there is more passing.
It seems like Gateway doesn't mind. For three years, Gateway has had the second-best oval crowd by a country mile and it is definitely in the top five races people look forward to the most along with Mid-Ohio, Long Beach, Road America and the Indianapolis 500.
I think we all want to ensure the racing will be excellent but it seems like people are already happy. Maybe IndyCar doesn't have to do a thing.
18. Eight days until Portland and we have two races to go. August will be over the next time the green flag falls to start a race. The end is near my friends.
