NASCAR: McDowell wins Verizon 200 Cup race at Indy

Michael McDowell dominated the Verizon 200 NASCAR Cup race at Indy Sunday and drove to a 0.937-second win over Chase Elliott.

–by Mark Cipolloni–

His first Cup race win was at the Daytona 500 in a win that was a bit lucky as the leaders crashed in front of him and the seas parted, allowing McDowell to scoot to victory.

This time the 38-year-old’s win was legitimate, dominating all day long, leading 54 of 82 laps in a race that ran caution free except for Lap 1.

The No. 34 Front Row Motorsports driver becomes the 13th driver to punch his ticket to the postseason on a victory.

“I was really trying to pace myself,” McDowell said. “I figured there would be a late-race caution, and I didn’t want to burn my stuff up. I was just trying to maintain that gap.

“Then when I got into traffic, (Elliott) started closing, I had to push it, but I just can’t believe it.”

“Winning the Daytona 500 was one of the coolest moments you could ever have,” said McDowell, one of the most accomplished road racers in the Cup Series. “But going to Victory Lane without your family, that was tough.

“So we cherry-pick. We come to the races we think we can win… Just so proud… You know, I thought we could point our way in (to the playoffs), but after the car that we had yesterday in practice, I thought, man, we’ve got a good shot at winning if we could just get track position and maintain it.”

“Just needed to be a little better through the back half (of the course) over there and get off of (Turn) 14 a little better just to have myself in a better spot getting into (Turn) 1,” said Elliott.

“Just really appreciate the effort, man. Our Napa Chevy was really good, really good. Just needed just a little bit more and came up a bit short. But congrats to Michael, man. He did a good job. Ran a great race and stayed mistake-free, and that’s what you’ve got to do to win.”

Polesitter Daniel Suarez came home 3rd, 5.75s back.

“We win, and we lose as a team, and that’s all I can say,” said Suárez, who salvaged a third-place finish. “The guys brought a very fast race car. I felt that maybe we were one adjustment behind in the first run with the back of the car, but then we made it a little bit better.

“But I felt like I was always one step behind the No. 9 and the No. 34, and then at the end, I felt that when my car came alive again, we had that issue.

“Just a little bit heartbreaking, but that’s part of the sport. All we can do is continue to push, continue to build race cars like this, and I’ll keep on winning races.”

Tyler Reddick and Alex Bowman rounded out the top-5.

Chase Briscoe, Martin Truex Jr., Kyle Larson, Christopher Bell and Chicago Street Course winner Shane van Gisbergen completed the top 10.

Two races remain in the Cup Series regular season as the circuit shifts to Watkins Glen International next Sunday

Race Results

POS	CAR	DRIVER	MAKE	BEHIND	LAPS
1	34	Michael McDowell		0.000	82
2	9	Chase Elliott		0.937	82
3	99	Daniel Suarez		5.750	82
4	45	Tyler Reddick		6.437	82
5	48	Alex Bowman		19.994	82
6	14	Chase Briscoe		22.160	82
7	19	Martin Truex Jr.		22.956	82
8	5	Kyle Larson		24.152	82
9	20	Christopher Bell		24.549	82
10	91	* Shane Van Gisbergen(i)		25.016	82
11	17	Chris Buescher		25.317	82
12	54	Ty Gibbs #		25.860	82
13	12	Ryan Blaney		34.084	82
14	24	William Byron		36.581	82
15	2	Austin Cindric		36.643	82
16	3	Austin Dillon		38.075	82
17	1	Ross Chastain		38.688	82
18	23	Bubba Wallace		57.614	82
19	11	Denny Hamlin		66.687	82
20	6	Brad Keselowski		67.764	82
21	21	Harrison Burton		75.168	82
22	33	* Brodie Kostecki		82.653	82
23	4	Kevin Harvick		89.277	81
24	42	Mike Rockenfeller		-1	81
25	47	Ricky Stenhouse Jr.		-1	81
26	16	AJ Allmendinger		-1	81
27	77	Ty Dillon		-1	81
28	15	Jenson Button		-1	81
29	7	Corey LaJoie		-1	81
30	51	Andy Lally		-1	81
31	41	Ryan Preece		-1	81
32	78	Josh Bilicki(i)		-1	81
33	67	* Kamui Kobayashi(i)		-1	81
34	22	Joey Logano		-1	81
35	43	Erik Jones		-1	81
36	8	Kyle Busch		-2	80
37	38	Todd Gilliland		-2	80
38	31	Justin Haley		-2	80
39	10	Aric Almirola		-3	79

# DENOTES ROOKIE
(i) NOT ELIGIBLE FOR POINTS
(*) REQUIRED TO QUALIFY ON TIME