By David Morgan, Associate Editor
LEBANON, Tenn. – Colton Herta may have won the battle, but Alex Palou won the war.
In a frantic season finale on the 1.33-mile Nashville Superspeedway oval, Colton Herta put on a fearless drive the closing laps, streaking past Pato O’Ward with five laps remaining to pull away for his second win of the 2024 NTT IndyCar Series season and first career win on an oval.
As the laps wound down, it became a battle of those who could make it to the end on fuel and those who couldn’t. Lap after lap, the leaders that were running short on fuel peeled off track, cycling O’Ward to the lead with five laps to go, but Herta was right in his tire tracks just waiting for his chance to strike.
The two leaders ran up on the slower car of Sting Ray Robb, forcing them to split him, with Herta coming out the other side with the lead. From there he was able to open a gap of 1.801 seconds to streak across the line and claim the win.
“It was a good race for us today. The car was fantastic. I was able to do a lot with it. I think that’s kind of what put us over the edge to win,” Herta said.
“It’s about time. I think there’s been multiple times where I thought we could have won or should have won, and numerous of things would have happened to stop us from doing that.
“Luckily today we got it all all right. We needed a little bit of help. I think that was in the form of a little bit of traffic to catch back up to Pato. I think it was, from my perspective, a really exciting race for it to close out like that right in the last few laps, have me battle Pato, then Josef close to battling Pato.
O’Ward explained that he had to fight a battle on two fronts in the closing laps, trying to fend off Herta in traffic while also struggling with the handle on his car fading each lap that passed.
“I wish I could have done it a little bit harder on him. Sting Ray facilitated that. A bit of a stinger to lose it that way. I would have liked to have at least fight him for a little bit more.
No, it was a pretty hectic race for our 5 car, to be honest. I had no idea where I was the whole race till the end. Guys are starting to pit and you are leading. That’s great. I just tried to continue pushing.
Oh, my God, those reds at the end, I couldn’t see straight with so much vibrations. Could barely talk to the team with just how much was going on in the car. Yeah, pretty gnarly in the end.”
Josef…
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