While NASCAR may own Iowa Speedway, Team Penske’s Josef Newgarden laid his claim to the Netwon, Iowa property after sweeping the Hy-Vee Weekend at the 7/8-mile oval.
Newgarden’s win on Sunday (July 23) was somehow even more impressive than his win on Saturday. During Sunday’s race, Newgarden took the lead almost 100 laps earlier than he did on Saturday. But he had to survive one late curveball.
On lap 240, Ryan Hunter-Reay hit the wall out of turn 4 and sprayed debris over that section of the racetrack, causing a late-race caution.
Only five cars were on the lead lap. Due to the low amount of laps, race control made the call for the pits to remain closed for the field and lapped cars were put at the rear of the field, creating a three-lap dash at the end of the race.
Newgarden was able to hang on for the win. Will Power ended up second and Alex Palou finished the weekend off in third. Felix Rosenqvist finished fourth and Scott McLaughlin ended up fifth due to having the oldest tires of the top five. McLaughlin would have dropped further back had more cars been on the lead lap.
Newgarden took advantage of a battle that his Penske teammates Power and McLaughlin had through lapped traffic to pass both of them on lap 31. Outside of a challenge from McLaughlin on a lap 108 restart, nobody could get very close to Newgarden until the final restart.
The first caution of the day came out on lap 87. Augustin Canapino hit the wall out of turn 2 and was able to continue on, but finished in 26th, 14 laps down.
Takuma Sato hit the wall on lap 141 out of turn 2. There was no caution but his team had to change the toe link, relegating the former Indianapolis 500 champion to 25th at the finish, 13 laps down.
Sting Ray Robb pitted on lap 156, but his tire changer had not secured the right rear tire before Robb left the pits. Robb went back down pit road on the next lap but his tire did not come with him. It rolled onto the track in front of oncoming cars, sending some diving low and others diverting high in avoidance.
Multiple drivers, including leader Newgarden, were able to avoid the tire before the caution came out. The tire eventually came to a stop in the grass in the infield. Robb was disqualified from the event as a result of the incident.
2023 Indycar Hy-Vee One Step 250 Results
The next IndyCar event will be the Music City Grand Prix, on the streets of Nashville. Coverage of the event will begin on Sunday, August 6th at 12 p.m. ET on NBC.
About the author
Michael has watched NASCAR for 20 years and regularly covered the sport from 2013-2021, and also formerly covered the SRX series from 2021-2023. He now covers the FIA Formula 1 World Championship, the NASCAR Xfinity Series, and road course events in the NASCAR Cup Series.
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Unreal how strong Josef is at this track. He makes it look like everyone else is running in slow motion.