NEWTON, Iowa — With Josef Newgarden scoring his sixth career victory at Iowa Speedway and sweeping the doubleheader Hy-Vee IndyCar Race Weekend, maybe they should rename the town “Newgarden, Iowa.”
NASCAR may be the official owners of the track and Penske Entertainment may have leased the facility, but Newgarden owns Iowa Speedway, due to his latest triumph in Sunday’s Hy-Vee One Step 250 presented by Gatorade.
Not even a late race caution and a restart with three laps to go was enough for anyone in the field to catch the Team Penske driver from claiming his sixth career win at Iowa and his fifth-straight oval win. That matches A.J. Foyt in 1964, as well as Al Unser in 1968 and 1970.
It was also Newgarden’s 29th career NTT IndyCar Series win, tying him with the great Rick Mears of Penske Racing.
Newgarden led 212 laps in the 250-lap race. Teammate and pole winner Will Power led 30 laps and finished 0.7050-of-a-second behind Newgarden’s No. 2 Hitachi Chevrolet.
Alex Palou of Chip Ganassi Racing, who entered the weekend with a 117-point lead in the NTT IndyCar Series standings, finished third after starting 12th on what he considered to be his biggest obstacle to a second IndyCar championship. Palou also finished eighth on Saturday.
Combined with Newgarden’s doubleheader sweep, Palou’s lead is now 80 points with five races remaining.
There were eight lead changes among six drivers. There were also 1,168 total passes including 379 for position.
“It was a different twist today,” Newgarden said. “It was by no means easy. Today was different. We thought it would have a different twist and it did. We have a really good baseline race car here. It’s impossible to win here without a really good race car and we always seem to have it.
“To win on Day One, it doesn’t really feel like we have finished.
“Today’s win, we’re done. We can leave here now feeling good.”
Keyword: Newgarden Ties Foyt, Unser With Fifth Straight Oval Win