Finally, Josef Newgarden has a crown jewel race win.
The two-time series champion captured the checkered flag on the historic streets of Long Beach, leading a race-high 32 laps today. “We knew we had a good strategy and made good fuel with Team Chevy and I had everything I needed today with pit stops, as you saw when I had to get around Alex. The out-lap with Palou was more risky,” Newgarden noted.
“We got together in Turn 5 going in deep, and that almost didn’t work out when we were side-by-side into that corner, and then side-by-side again in Turn 6. That was the difficult battle. Grosjean, overall, just had a better shot at getting it done. Fortunately, we just held on.”
The Team Penske driver made it back-to-back wins this season after winning the previous race at Texas last month. After failing to win a race through the first eight events last year, the team has now won all three races to start this season.
Today’s victory is the 22nd of Newgarden’s career, and the biggest so far. “It’s definitely up there on the list,” Newgarden said. “Man, this was a fight today, this is not an easy race to win. I was working my butt off with Grosjean at the end there on the used reds, I was hoping that he’d fade a bit towards the end. Trying to hold him off on the restart was super difficult. So proud of Team Penske. I’ve been trying to win a race here for 11 years so I’m happy to get it done.”
Romain Grosjean nearly won his first IndyCar race at the second-biggest event on the calendar. The Andretti Autosport driver very nearly took the race lead from Newgarden in the closing laps, but just didn’t have enough to get by the No. 2 Chevrolet. Still, it was a fantastic result for the second-year driver.
It was a Penske, Andretti, and Ganassi podium once again, as reigning series champion Alex Palou finished just behind Newgarden and Grosjean. The driver of the No. 10 Honda took over the lead during the first round of pit stops, led 22 laps, and stayed near the…
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