The NTT IndyCar Series made its way to Newton, IA, at the Iowa Speedway for a doubleheader weekend starting Friday night with race one of the Iowa IndyCar 250s.
Qualifying took place earlier in the day, and Connor Daly secured his first career pole, alongside him was Josef Newgarden. Simon Pagenaud was unable to qualify and started in last place. Newgarden has won twice at Iowa Speedway, including last year’s race.
Daly led the first thirteen laps before Josef Newgarden took over the lead on lap fourteen. Once Newgarden got the lead, he was in total control early in the race. On lap 47, green flag pit stops began as Takuma Sato was the first one on pit road. While green flag stops were happening, Pato O’Ward got by Alexander Rossi for the fifth position. Newgarden was still leading when he finally made his scheduled pit stop at lap 70, and the new leader was Felix Rosenqvist, who had not yet pitted.
Rosenqvist led seven laps before making his scheduled pit stop as Takuma Sato took over the lead. While Soto led, Josef Newgarden was challenging Will Power for the second position. Also, Colton Herta was battling Santino Ferrucci for the eleventh position. Ferrucci was the last car on the lead lap. After several tries to take the second position away from Power, Newgarden was able to take the position from Power on lap 126 just as Soto was making his second scheduled pit stop and took over the lead on lap 127.
On the next lap, Marco Andretti suffered a mechanical issue that put him out of the race. He would finish in the 22nd position.
Newgarden led eleven laps before making his second scheduled pit stop of the day as Simon Pagenaud, who started in last place due to him not qualifying, was now the new leader. Not much was happening around the track as Pagenaud led until the first caution came out at lap 144 when Will Power’s car went high and hit the outside wall off of turn four, and his left front tire popped off. After the hit, Power informed his crew that something broke.
Some cars did come to pit road under caution while the leaders stayed out. As the race was set to resume, IndyCar officials waved off the restart; however, down the track, Rinus VeeKay checked up, causing Colton Herta, who was right behind him to hit him and send his car flying over VeeKay’s car and landing back onto the track. The aero screens that IndyCar put on all cars saved VeeKay’s life as the wreck could’ve been much worse. Both drivers were ok after the crash.
The caution was extended for the wreck clean up, and Simon Pagenaud headed to pit road relinquishing the lead to Pato O’Ward. The race resumed on lap 170. Pagenaud was able to get by the number seven car of Oliver Askew for second and had his sights set on O’Ward. He would catch and pass O’Ward for the lead on turn one of lap 177. As Pagenaud regained the lead, Scott Dixon, at one point, was a lap down in the race, made his way to second place, and began chasing down Pagenaud as the laps were winding down.
Dixon was catching Pagenaud each lap. Unfortunately for Dixon, he ran out of time as Simon Pagenaud won race one of the Iowa IndyCar 250s by .4954 seconds over Scott Dixon, who finished in second place. There were only eight cars on the lead lap when the race was over.
The rest of the top ten finishers were Oliver Askew third, Pato O’Ward fourth, Josef Newgarden fifth, Alexander Rossi sixth, Jack Harvey seventh, Conor Daly eighth, Takuma Sato ninth, one lap down, and Alex Palou tenth, also one lap down. There were seven lead changes by six drivers, one caution for 26 laps.
The biggest takeaway from this race was that the aero screen passed its first significant test on the VeeKay and Herta incident. This is a significant win for IndyCar as they continue to invent safety products to protect the drivers. Race two of the Iowa IndyCar 250s will take place Saturday at 8:30 pm on NBCSN.
