MADISON, Ill. — Kyle Kirkwood won his second-straight NTT IndyCar Series race in Sunday night’s Bommarito Automotive Group 400 at World Wide Technology Raceway.
It was Kirkwood’s first win on an oval and the fifth IndyCar Series race of his career as the Andretti Global driver found the speed at the end of a highly chaotic, very entertaining race.
It was the first time and IndyCar Series race was televised on a Sunday night by a major network as FOX Sports rearranged its popular Sunday night schedule to give IndyCar a broader audience.
What they saw was an action-packed event with a surprise ending. The winner made 71 passes in Sunday night’s race.
“Man, the starts and the restarts were big,” Kirkwood said. “That was absolusley huge. We were not happy with the car yesterday and we made some changes and as it got dark and cooled down, this Honda No. 27 came alive.
“These guys killed it on pit lane. Third win of the year and my first oval win, I’m over the moon. I wanted an oval win more than a street course; I’m not going to lie. This is a big win for the team.
“This is huge. Massive.”
Pato O’Ward finished second, 0.5398-of-a-second behind the race winner.
“I hope it was an amazing show for all you fans, it’s fantastic to be racing under the lights again,” O’Ward said. “All in all, a very good points day for the No. 5 Chevy.”
Christian Rasmussen of ECR finished third, the best finish of his career.
“As soon as I found out the high line was so effective, I started running high and I was picking cars off one after another,” Rasmussen said. “It was an awesome, awesome end.”
Rasmussen finished sixth in this year’s Indianapolis 500.
Scott Dixon of Chip Ganassi Racing was fourth and Santino Ferrucci of A.J. Foyt Racing rounded out the top five in the No. 14 Chevrolet.
To add to the epic drama of this event, it began to rain just a few minutes after the checkered flag waved.
At the halfway point of the race on Lap 130, Team Penske’s Josef Newgarden led David Malukas just before he had one of the most horrific crashes in his career when his car crashed and landed upside down at the start/finish line. It took 11 members of the AMR Safety Crew to turn Newgarden’s No. 2 Chevrolet over onto its wheels. Newgarden climbed from the race car.
Louis Foster triggered the crash when his car was loose coming out of Turn 4. He tried to regain control, but it slid in front of Newgarden’s speeding Chevrolet, which slammed into it and went airborne, turning over on its top.
Newgarden’s car nearly cleared the wall between the front straight and pit lane.
Newgarden was checked and released from the IU Health Medical Unit but refused to talk to the media.
Foster, however, did speak and said he originally lost control because his car got into the “marbles” – the scattered pellets of used tire rubber that had drifted onto the high line of the race course.
“We were running really, really well,” Foster explained. “I went from 21st and was up to about 10th, running the high line the entire time, but I came up behind Malukas,
got a bit of a wiggle. I had that a few times in the race and wasn’t too worried about it.
“But just at that stage of the race the marble build up was so much bigger than I’d experienced and just go into the marbles.
“And then I was a passenger.
“I was on the brakes trying to sit on the car and get it keep out the wall and broke the toe link and then I couldn’t control the car.
“I’m glad Josef is OK because that looked pretty scary for him.”
When the race went back to green 20 laps later, O’Ward was the leader and Conor Daly was up to second place as he attempted to go for the lead with an outside move on Lap 151.
Daly took the lead on Lap 154 as the driver from Noblesville, Indiana did not give up the battle and began to pull away from O’Ward.
Daly was the leader when he came into pit lane on Lap 191 after making 28 passes up to that point. Christian Rasmussen, however, had made 51 passes and had made his way 19 positions up the grid when he passed McLaughlin for position.
Malukas got into the marbles on Lap 195 and brushed the wall for a caution. At that point, Dixon had yet to pit and was one-lap ahead of the field. He was able to pit on Lap 200 and maintain the lead ahead of O’Ward, Kyle Kirkwood and Daly.
IndyCar sent out the track sweeper to clean the track from the marbles.
Dixon was the leader when the race resumed with 53 laps to go. Dixon was able to pull away from the field, but further back in the field, it was three-wide and even four-wide involving points leader Alex Palou.
McLaughlin, the final Team Penske driver left in the race, climbed out of his car on Lap 230 after the car experience right rear damage.
“Something broke, I don’t know, left rear,” McLaughlin said. “It felt like somebody hit me. Not a clean night, but questionable start. I’m very disappointed because we had a really decent car.”
Kirkwood pitted with 26 laps to go. Dixon came into the pits for his final stop on Lap 237, giving O’Ward the lead before he pitted one lap later to put Santino Ferrucci in front.
Dixon’s stop was not as fast as O’Ward’s, and Kirkwood’s and he returned to the track behind both drivers. Ferrucci stayed on the track until he made his final stop on Lap 245.
When he pitted, Ericsson was in front ahead of Ilott and Rosenqvist.
Ericsson pitted on Lap 248 and Ilott was the leader.
Rosenqvist passed Ilott going into Turn 3 with 10 laps to go as both of those drivers were trying to make it to the checkered flag on fuel.
Kirkwood was one-second faster, however, as he began to reel in second-place Ilott. He flew past Ilott’s Chevrolet. with eight laps to go for second place. Rosenqvist pitted and that put Ilott back in front with six laps remaining.
With five laps to go, Kirkwood was charging and passed Ilott into Turn 1 as Ilott had to drive to pit lane.
With four laps to go, the battle was between Kirkwood and O’Ward with Rasmussen in third.
Kirkwood took the white flag as the leader and made it around to the checkered flag for his second-straight victory.
Earlier in the race, after a massive pyrotechnic display that looked like a bomb went off on the backstretch on the first parade lap, it was a very clean start as the field of 27 made it safely around the 1.25-mile oval.
Malukas passed polesitter Will Power at the start of the race and was in front when Rahal Letterman Lanigan’s Devlin DeFrancesco spun and crashed into the Turn 1 SAFER Barrier on Lap 4.
Six laps later, racing resumed with Malukas leading the field to the green.
After 25 laps, Malukas was 1.6904 seconds ahead of Power as the field settled in.
On Lap 47, second-place Power brushed the wall in Turn 4 and damaged the steering arm on the suspension, damaging the No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet. The car continued around the course back to pit lane as he did his best to keep the car straight.
Malukas led McLaughlin and Josef Newgarden at the time of the yellow flag.
During pit stops, Christian Rasmussen’s Chevrolet left his pit area in flames, but they were extinguished as he drove away.
McLaughlin won the race off pit lane and was scored the leader. Meantime, Power’s crew continued to work on his car.
“It was right front tire failure,” Power explained. “Man, I felt last night while we were running, we were pretty much flat through Turn 3 and 4 every lap. I thought that was a lot of load. When I had a failure at Iowa it felt the same. That actually happened. It was unfortunate for us. Blew the front. You’re literally flat every lap through (Turn) 3 and 4 here.”
As Power watched the video replay of the crash, he said, “Nothing I could do there. Unfortunate.
“I feel bad for everybody on the Verizon crew. We had a good car, sitting there saving fuel, trying to get a big number to make it a four-stop race. I know Malukas was just taking off. I figured he just catch traffic and get to him and probably knock a stop off the race.
“Nothing was going to stop a tire failure, but that’s the way it is.
“We’ll go to the next one and see if we can get a win. We’re knocking on the door, but not today.”
