PORTLAND, Ore. — Will Power remained in the IndyCar championship hunt with a wire-to-wire victory Sunday at Portland International Raceway.
Power started second alongside polesitter Santino Ferrucci — the first A.J. Foyt Racing driver to lead the field to green in a decade — but an alliance between Team Penske and the Foyt organization allowed Power and Ferrucci to make a plan for the start.
Sixty-six points behind championship leader Alex Palou at the start of the race, Power vowed to be aggressive at the start and drive like three-time Formula 1 champion Max Verstappen. The 43-year-old Australian was serious about it, too, as he slid ahead of Ferrucci entering the first turn.
“Santino and I talked about the start, he was a very good teammate,” Power said.
Palou, who started third, finished just under 10 seconds back in second as Power won for the third time this season. Palou wondered if his Chip Ganassi Racing team was too conservative with its strategy.
“It was tough work there trying to catch Will,” Palou said. “I’m not uncomfortable. I think we’ve got a lot of work to do, but I love adversity and the opportunity we have in front of us.”
Power now trails Palou, who was the defending Portland winner and is seeking a third championship in four seasons, by 54 points with three races remaining.
“If he had finished ahead of us, it would be over. This just kept it alive,” Power later added of the importance of the victory. “It’s going to be the same for the rest of the year. You’ve got no choice but to be ahead of him.”
Power teammate Josef Newgarden finished third and was followed by Colton Herta of Andretti Global, Marcus Armstrong of Chip Ganassi Racing and Marcus Ericsson of Andretti. Scott McLaughlin of Penske was seventh and Ferrucci, seeking his first career victory, faded to eighth.
“It’s unfortunate, but man, I had fun,” Ferrucci said. “To get the pole for us was a huge deal. It’s huge to qualify on pole, we’ve just been so consistent.”
Ferrucci has eight top-10 finishes this season and, ranked a career-high 10th in the standings, is on track for a breakthrough season in a contract year with Foyt.
Power won in a Chevrolet but the three Penske drivers and Ferrucci were outnumbered in the final standings by six Hondas in the top 10.
Power has raced Nashville Superspeedway, site of the season finale, once before and has one victory in six previous starts at the Milwaukee Mile. He’ll seek to chip into Palou’s lead even more in…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at www.espn.com – RPM…