IndyCar: Newgarden wins Acura GP of Long Beach
Team Penske got Josef Newgarden out fast in both pitstops and the #2 Hitachi Chevy driver did the rest to hold off Romain Grosjean and Alex Palou over the final 20 laps to win the Acura GP of Long Beach.
The soon-to-be father, Newgarden had to survive a late restart when Jimmie Johnson crashed yet again when he lost control of his Ganassi Honda in Turn 8.
Newgarden commented after the race, “This win is definitely up there on the list. This was a fight today. This is not an easy race to win. I don’t know what it looked like from the outside, but I was working my butt off with Grosjean there at the end on the used reds. I was hoping he would fade a little bit.”
” Holding him off on that restart was super difficult. This Hitachi car was on it. I knew coming in to the race we had a great strategy and with Team Chevy we were going to be alright. With pit stops helping me get around Alex (Palou), I’m so proud of Team Penske. I have been to win a race here for 11 years so I’m so happy to finally get it done.”
Newgarden now leads the point standings with 118 to 113 for his teammate Scott McLaughlin as Team Penske has won all the races so far this year. It has been five years since Newgarden has won back-to-back races.
#27 Andretti Autosport driver Romain Grosjean had the fastest car at the end, passed Palou for 2nd, but ran out of Push-to-Pass and was unable to pass Newgarden despite getting side-by-side with Newgarden under braking two to three times.
Quote from Romain Grosjean:
“Through the race, at the beginning, I didn’t want to get stuck behind some drivers that were on a different strategy. I was behind Scott Dixon for a while and I knew he was on a three stopper, so I used some there before the pit and after the pit trying to make
some good way ahead. think that was it. I had 30 seconds with 42 left, I used 15 on the straight with Alex, but he had a really good break to Turn 1. That was late.”
Defending NTT INDYCAR Series champion Palou took the lead after the first round of pitstops with some fast work from his Ganassi pit crew, but lost it after the 2nd round of stops and had to settle for 3rd in the #10 NTT Data Ganassi Honda.
Quote from Alex Palou:
“Yeah, it was a good day for us. Started third. We had to be aggressive with the strategy there to try and beat Newgarden and Colton there in the first stop. We did, and the guys did an amazing strategy, amazing stop, and we came out in P1.”
“Then we were leading for some laps, but I could see that we were lacking a bit of speed compared to Josef. We had to pit because we pitted two laps earlier, so we had not a lot of fuel, and he got us. It was a good battle with him on track, as well. I think it was on the limit, but we tried, both of us. He won today.”
” And then on the restart with Romain, I couldn’t really do much. I was really bad out of the hairpin and he was really good all the race and also with red tires, so yeah, not much I could have done. But it was a good day for the 10 car.”
Alex Palou had to settle for 3rd – Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach – By_ Chris OwensThe Spaniard now has more championship points for this season than he had at this time last season.
Will Power and Pato O’Ward rounded out the top-5.
Quote from Pato O’Ward
“After the first two races of the season, I’ll take finishing fifth. It is a good solid foundation to build on for the rest of the year. We can work from here. We learned some good things through warm-up and the race that should help us when we come back and when we go to another street course.”
“I think this is a very solid start to our charge for a championship. I know it’s the third race, but this is what we needed. Barber is next and I love that place.”
Polesitter Colton Herta led the first 28 laps, but lost the lead on the first round of pitstops. Pushing Newgarden hard for 2nd, he missed his braking point and crashed in turn 9 just before his 2nd pitstop. He came walking back to the pits after that finished his day.
Race Results
| Pos | No | Name | Laps | Behind | Gap | Pits | Led | ST | Engine | Points | Team |
| 1 | 2 | Josef Newgarden | 85 | 0.000s | 0.000s | 2 | 32 | 2 | Chevy | 118 | Team Penske |
| 2 | 28 | Romain Grosjean | 85 | 1.2869 | 1.2869 | 2 | 0 | 6 | Honda | 75 | Andretti Autosport |
| 3 | 10 | Alex Palou | 85 | 1.7594 | 0.4725 | 2 | 22 | 3 | Honda | 103 | Chip Ganassi Racing |
| 4 | 12 | Will Power | 85 | 2.9654 | 1.2060 | 2 | 2 | 7 | Chevy | 102 | Team Penske |
| 5 | 5 | Pato O’Ward | 85 | 3.7122 | 0.7468 | 2 | 0 | 11 | Chevy | 63 | Arrow McLaren SP |
| 6 | 9 | Scott Dixon | 85 | 5.0605 | 1.3483 | 2 | 0 | 16 | Honda | 83 | Chip Ganassi Racing |
| 7 | 15 | Graham Rahal | 85 | 5.3931 | 0.3326 | 2 | 0 | 13 | Honda | 60 | Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
| 8 | 27 | Alexander Rossi | 85 | 7.3084 | 1.9153 | 2 | 0 | 5 | Honda | 40 | Andretti Autosport |
| 9 | 06 | Helio Castroneves | 85 | 8.9521 | 1.6437 | 2 | 0 | 14 | Honda | 46 | Meyer Shank Racing |
| 10 | 14 | Kyle Kirkwood | 85 | 12.8631 | 3.9110 | 2 | 0 | 12 | Chevy | 38 | AJ Foyt Enterprises |
| 11 | 7 | Felix Rosenqvist | 85 | 14.2930 | 1.4299 | 2 | 0 | 4 | Chevy | 42 | Arrow McLaren SP |
| 12 | 20 | Conor Daly | 85 | 15.2177 | 0.9247 | 2 | 0 | 17 | Chevy | 39 | Ed Carpenter Racing |
| 13 | 21 | Rinus VeeKay | 85 | 16.2460 | 1.0283 | 3 | 0 | 15 | Chevy | 67 | Ed Carpenter Racing |
| 14 | 3 | Scott McLaughlin | 85 | 17.9291 | 1.6831 | 3 | 0 | 9 | Chevy | 113 | Team Penske |
| 15 | 45 | Jack Harvey | 85 | 18.7807 | 0.8516 | 2 | 0 | 20 | Honda | 32 | Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
| 16 | 11 | Tatiana Calderon | 84 | 1 LAPS | 1 LAPS | 3 | 0 | 26 | Chevy | 20 | AJ Foyt Enterprises |
| 17 | 51 | Takuma Sato | 83 | 9.9385 | 0.5578 | 2 | 0 | 22 | Honda | 44 | Dale Coyne Racing w/RWR |
| 18 | 30 | Christian Lundgaard | 83 | 2 LAPS | 81.4317 | 3 | 0 | 19 | Honda | 42 | Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
| 19 | 60 | Simon Pagenaud | 81 | 4 LAPS | 2 LAPS | 3 | 0 | 10 | Honda | 50 | Meyer Shank Racing |
| 20 | 48 | Jimmie Johnson | 73 | Contact | 1 LAPS | 3 | 0 | 25 | Honda | 45 | Chip Ganassi Racing |
| 21 | 18 | David Malukas | 72 | Contact | 67.2604 | 4 | 0 | 18 | Honda | 34 | Dale Coyne Racing with HMD |
| 22 | 8 | Marcus Ericsson | 66 | Contact | 0.3937 | 2 | 0 | 8 | Honda | 66 | Chip Ganassi Racing |
| 23 | 26 | Colton Herta | 55 | Contact | 1 LAPS | 1 | 28 | 1 | Honda | 59 | Andretti Autosport |
| 24 | 77 | Callum Ilott | 55 | Contact | 35.7264 | 4 | 0 | 21 | Chevy | 32 | Juncos Hollinger Racing |
| 25 | 29 | Devlin DeFrancesco | 35 | Contact | 1 LAPS | 4 | 1 | 23 | Honda | 20 | Andretti Steinbrenner Autosport |
| 26 | 4 | Dalton Kellett | 5 | Contact | 2.0461 | 0 | 24 | Chevy | 23 | AJ Foyt Enterprises |
Race Statistics
Winner’s average speed: 93.977 mph
Time of Race: 1:46:48.0102
Margin of victory: Under caution
Cautions: 4 for 14 laps
Lead changes: 5 among 5 drivers
Lap Leaders:
Herta, Colton 1 – 28
Newgarden, Josef 29
Power, Will 30 – 31
DeFrancesco, Devlin 32
Palou, Alex 33 – 54
Newgarden, Josef 55 – 85
NTT INDYCAR SERIES Point Standings: Newgarden 118, McLaughlin 113, Palou 103, Power 102, Dixon 83, Grosjean 75, VeeKay 67, Ericsson 66, O’Ward 63, Rahal 60.