Josef Newgarden wins his third race of the season at Iowa Speedway

The NTT IndyCar Series made its way to Iowa Speedway on Saturday afternoon for the first of two races in the Hy-Vee Homefront 250. This was the 18^th IndyCar race held at Iowa Speedway dating back to 2007. Dario Franchitti won the first race at Iowa on June 24, 2007.

IndyCar held qualifying for both races on Saturday morning with Will Power winning both poles and Scott McLaughlin starting second in both races. For Power, it was his 69^th and 70^th career poles and the 15^th consecutive this year.

Will Power got off to an excellent start at Iowa. His car was the fastest early on in the race lapping cars. At one point, there were only 11 cars on the lead lap. On lap 20, Colton Herta and Alex Palou battled for sixth position but then Herta’s car slipped away.

He fell to tenth place before making an early pit stop on lap 40. During the pit stop, his pit crew had problems with the air gun changing the left front wheel. By the time they got the tire on, Herta fell a lap down and the pit stop lasted 43 seconds.

Will Power made his first pit stop on lap 63 with Alex Palou taking the lead. Palou pitted one lap later then Will Power resumed the lead. Throughout the races, marbles developed on the high ends of the racetrack causing everyone to run near the yellow line.

Will Power and Scott McLaughlin were in a heated battle for the lead. However, whenever McLaughlin got close to Power, traffic was a factor and slowed him down. Once they would clear traffic, McLaughlin would get close again only for traffic to slow him down.

The turning point of the race came in the second half. Josef Newgarden passed McLaughlin for second place before setting his sites on Will Power. On lap 120, Will Power went high at the exit of Turn 2 and Newgarden muscled his way past him for the lead and never looked back.

Will Power led 119 laps before losing the lead. By lap 149, Power fell to fourth place when McLaughlin and Pato O’Ward drove by him for positions. This race was caution free until lap 152 when Graham Rahal hit the wall at Turn 4.

On replay, it looked like his steering broke. You could see Rahal’s hands battling hard to keep control but the car went the other way. It was the only caution of the race.

Once the race resumed, Newgarden floored it. He was lapping cars as the race was winding down. It did get interesting in the final laps. Scott McLaughlin was giving everything he had to get to Newgarden. Both drivers were fighting lapped traffic.

With 41 laps to go, there was chaos on pit road when Benjamin Pedersen left pit road but hit Devlin DeFrancesco who was entering his pit stall. DeFrancesco then hit Santino Ferrucci. Pedersen was issued a drive-through penalty for unsafe release and contact in pit lane.

Meanwhile, the lapped traffic was racing hard to stay on the lead lap which frustrated both drivers. In the end, Newgarden held on to beat McLaughlin by 3.755 seconds for his fifth win at Iowa Speedway and third win of the season. There were only five cars on the lead lap.

With the win, Newgarden will split $10,000 with Team Penske and his chosen charities, SeriousFun Children’s Network and Wags and Walks Nashville, for his victory as part of the PeopleReady Force For Good Challenge. Newgarden led 129 laps.

The rest of the top five finishers were Pato O’Ward third, Marcus Ericsson fourth, Will Power fifth, Scott Dixon sixth, Kyle Kirkwood seventh, Alex Palou eighth, Takuma Sato ninth, and Alexander Rossi tenth. There were 1,502 on-track passes, an IndyCar Series record at Iowa Speedway.

“It’s a great day. My team, they are unbelievable. They always give me a great car. I show up every weekend, and I feel like I’ve got the best of the best behind me. I love Iowa,” said Newgarden. “We did not start where we wanted to be and it was right from qualifying. I was so frustrated to qualify how we did. I’ve messed up qualifying so many times here and it never gets easier. It was like that in the beginning of the race. It took us a stint and a half till we had the car just where it needed to be. But once it was comfy, it was the car to beat.”

“I badly want to beat that guy, and I’m going to be trying everything I can to beat him,” said Scott McLaughlin, who co-hosts “Bus Bros” with Newgarden. “But he’s the epitome of a great teammate, and I appreciate the help he’s given me.

The Iowa doubleheader concludes on Sunday at 2 pm on NBC. Click here to see Sunday’s starting lineup. Subscribe to Fubo to watch all of the 2023 NTT IndyCar Series season. Purchase tickets for all IndyCar races today on StubHub and Viagogo.

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