Newgarden resists amazing Malukas for Gateway IndyCar win

Josef Newgarden fended off sensational rookie David Malukas to reinvigorate his IndyCar Series title bid with a hard-fought victory at Gateway.

In a race interrupted by a long rain delay, Newgarden hung on to win by four tenths of a second as Dale Coyne Racing driver Malukas passed Newgarden’s Penske team-mate Scott McLaughlin for second on the final lap.

Newgarden and McLaughlin had taken control of the race by pitting during a yellow flag on lap 145 of 260 caused by Jack Harvey brushing the wall.

With rain expected all evening, it had been a cagey race of strategy and fuel-saving as teams tried to position themselves in case of an early red flag and declared result.

Having taken on fresh tyres and removed any fuel-mileage worries with that stop, Newgarden tore through the other cars on the lead lap after the restart with ease.

I'll take the lead, thank you very much!@josefnewgarden rockets past Patricio O'Ward for the race lead. #INDYCAR

📺 : @USA_Network and @peacockTV pic.twitter.com/ev9yBy0B41

— INDYCAR on NBC (@IndyCaronNBC) August 20, 2022

McLaughlin couldn’t quite match that and in the 14 laps Newgarden had up front before his team-mate reached second, he built up a 7s lead.

But McLaughlin trimmed that gap in traffic and then benefited from Newgarden getting trapped behind the slower Christian Lundgaard in the pit entry at the final stops to jump into the lead.

The rain finally arrived soon afterwards, with 43 laps left to run when the red flag came out.

Rather than declaring a result, IndyCar waited for conditions to clear and resumed the race for a final sprint after a two-hour wait.

At that point, Malukas was fifth. The Coyne team had gone off-sequence on strategies hoping to get Malukas or team-mate Takuma Sato up front in case of rain and though it didn’t quite succeed, it did get them right among the lead pack on slightly fresher tyres than those around them.

So while Newgarden blew back past McLaughlin when the race resumed, Malukas was soon overtaking first polesitter Will Power then McLaren’s Pato O’Ward to reach third and set off after the two leaders.

McLaughlin held Malukas back until the last lap, when a superb outside-line move took the Coyne car up to second – albeit slightly too late to catch Newgarden for the lead.

O’Ward finished fourth, having briefly looked a likely winner when he surged past long-time leader Power at the restart after the Harvey yellow.

Sato backed up team-mate Malukas with fifth ahead of Power, who retains a narrow championship lead of three points over Newgarden.

Ganassi wasn’t quite in the victory mix, though Marcus Ericsson shadowed leader Power in the first stint. Even pitting for fresh tyres and fuel top-offs ahead of the restart after the rain delay didn’t do much for the team’s pace and Marcus Ericsson, Scott Dixon and Alex Palou finished seventh through ninth ahead of Graham Rahal.

Race Results