The 2019 Indy Car season has had everything and in my humble opinion has been the most entertaining motorsport this season. With two races to go, it’s far from over. In fact after the last two races it is s ramping up to be a classic Californian showdown at the Corkscrew, the perfect venue to crown the king of American single seater racing.
With 15 races completed, there have been seven different winners and with two races to go its still a four way battle for the title which in includes Auckland’s own ultimate battler five time and current Indy Car champion, Scott Dixon (main picture).
Josef Newgarden, the the poster boy of Indy both on and off the track, deserves to lead the way after winning the first round on the streets of St Petersburg. He then went on to prove his versatility by winning Belle Isle, another street circuit, then on an oval in Texas and in Iowa.
Dixon also has won at the Detroit double header, followed by another win at one of his favorites, Mid-Ohio. That win for Dixon was his second of the season and the 46th of his career. It also extended his series record of most career wins at Mid-Ohio to six.
But Dixon’s story this season has been one of consistent finishers rather than a tally of wins and certainly no one on this side of the pond is counting out the Kiwi, with double points at the final round at Laguna Seca.
Then there’s the hard charging Alexander Rossi who also has two wins. After his narrow loss in the title race last season, he will be in a determined mood. If you’re not convinced, then check out some of his oval work which is more like a video game than reality. The Californian racer is still very much in the hunt in third with the showdown for the title in his own backyard.
Perhaps the best story of the four main contenders is second placed Simon Pagenaud. In the Month of May, he owned the Brickyard winning both the GP and the Indy 500, scoring a massive 163 points. There was double points from the 500 and he followed that up with another 54-points and a win at Toronto, Canada, and now lies just 38-points off the lead.
Now while the race for the title has been thrilling its the other stories and highlights along the way that have made this such a classic Indy season.
Rookie Colton Herta has been sensational. Winning at COTA in Austin in just the second race of the season, Colton appears unflappable and fearlessly fast. He may not have continued the results that would keep him in contention, but he’s certainly done enough to prove he’s one of Indy’s hottest properties.
He has also, along with Patricio O Ward, proved that the Road to Indy is producing world class drivers ready for the big time. Even more reason that last years TRS graduates should take up the offer of a free entry into the Indy test at the Brickyard 19-20 of October.
Then there’s Santino Ferrucci who has expunged his checkered past by driving out of his skin all season. On the ovals the former F1 Haas reserve driver has taken to left handers like a duck to water and his daredevil attitude and unfettered approach to some of the most demanding circuits in the world has been refreshing to watch. Is he rough around the edges? Sure, but he’s a kid barely 21 years-of-age.
It was just a few years ago in 2015 that he was an unknown junior hooning around New Zealand in the Castrol Toyota Racing Series. Last week he was challenging for a win with stalwarts Takuma Sato and Scott Dixon having led most of the race at Gateway.
Talking of Sato, he too has had an interesting and remarkable season. The 42 year-old has never looked sharper and has been in the hunt in every race with two wins, one at Barber and one from the back last weekend in St Louis. He now moves to sixth overall in the championship.
Ironically last weeks win came off the back of a very controversial weekend at Pocono where he was involved in a five car pile up on the very first lap of the 500 mile race. Alexander Rossi who was involved described Sato as “disgraceful” in his opinion for causing the incident.
On first look it did seem as though Sato may have been to blame and given the horrific accidents of the past few years at Pocono emotions were naturally running high. Over the following week before Sato’s dramatic win on Sunday, the Indy community were split, and Sato, who remains one of Indy’s most popular ,was under fire. He was unremorseful for what happened and defended his position as did his faithful fans.
So after his brilliant win on Sunday where he came from the rear of the field to win his second race of the season, I asked him myself how the week of going from zero-to-hero had been in this most extraordinary season.
TAKUMA SATO :
“Obviously it was a very unfortunate thing for everyone as no one wants to be involved in an incident like that. The difficulty was that the first reaction was taken with very few resources and not enough evidence so the people reacted with not enough information. They didn’t really know the truth. But later on I was able to post my onboard footage to show what were the facts. I basically just drove straight and it was wrong to say that I turned left or turned into Alex (Rossi). Obviously I feel very sorry for him involving his championship hopes.
“But we are travelling so fast and unfortunately what happened happened. I just wanted to make sure everybody to see what were the facts and and what was the truth. While everyone has their opinion, that’s fine. At least I wanted to show what actually happened. I wanted to show that I was not causing the problem of the accident, that’s not the correct reason for it, let’s put it that way.”
Sato’s race at St Louis was the perfect retort to a torrid week. He won over Ed Carpenter by the narrowest of margins, just 0.0399 seconds.
SATO:
“I thought Helio and my finish at the 500 was close 2017 and this one with Ed Carpenter was the same again – It really was a great show as it has been for the last few years at Gateway.
“We had a terrible first stint having to pit early and ended up a lap down. Then I had to go for longer stints in order to to get the lap back. But on Saturday we were racing not for the fuel, but for the tyres. Fuelwise, you could do 60 laps, but the tyres were very difficult. After 20 or 30 laps everybody was getting ‘graining’ and vibration.
“So we tuned our car for consistency and unfortunately the last but one stint was our longest crucially and in fact on the last 10 laps we were the fastest car out there.
“Then the yellow came just as my emergency fuel light came on and I was about to pit so the fuel cell was completely empty. I would have had one more lap only under green. So I was able to get in and refuel which was a miracle happening, the team did an amazing strategy to get me there at the end. “
So with two races to go its wide open in the Indycar championship for 2019 and the penultimate round is this weekend in Portland, Oregon.
Two weeks later its the final showdown at Laguna Seca, California with double points up for grabs. Scott Dixon in fourth is not in the perfect position, but then again he wasn’t last year. So tune in as you never know Dixie might just come out shooting for the last hurrah on the West Coast. One things for sure if the season so far is anything to go by it should be a cracking last two events in a classic battle in the wild wild west.
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