MADISON, Ill. — A penalty during Indy NXT by Firestone qualifying couldn’t stop Myles Rowe as the Georgia native won the 75-lap race at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway despite starting on the last row of the grid, the most positions gained for a win in the history of IndyCar’s development series.
“I think it was a chess game out there,” Rowe said. “I think confidence is key and Abel Motorsports, Force Indy the guys, they really gave me a car to have that kind of confidence to have a plan and be able to execute it and yeah, just so thrilled I can give this to them. Especially after the disappointment yesterday and having to start in the back, this is no doubt awesome.”
Rowe had a two-lap qualifying average that would have put the 25-year-old on the outside of the front row. However, he did an extra lap after his qualifying run instead of going to pit road, forcing race control to throw out his run, which averaged 162.560 mph.
“I knew it was my last lap. I even lifted,” Rowe said. “The radio was silent for whatever reason. I just put my foot back to the throttle because normally that’s just another push lap. Obviously I had to go through one and two. I was like, ‘Surely they’ll come on the radio and be like checkered, pit.’ Nothing happened. At that point it’s might as well just go instead of not finishing the next lap.
“Honestly, it was all on me. For sure I knew it was the last lap and should have pitted. We’ve been having radio issues the whole season. We did a whole kit change and everything to make sure I can hear clearly and things like that. It’s just a communication error.”
Rowe started the race in 24th, although he gained a position when Enzo Fittipaldi joined the starting grid as the field were completing their first green flag lap. After the first lap, Rowe was up to 19th place in a race that proved to be action-packed. There were 229 on-track passes, including 183 for position, of which 81 were within the top 10. All three of these figures are Indy NXT records. Rowe himself completed 29 passes.
The No. 99 Abel Motorsports with Force Indy entry was 15th by lap 5, although that pass wasn’t without its risks. As Rowe went underneath Alexander Koreiba in turn 3, Koreiba lost control of the No. 75 Juncos Racing entry and hit the wall, bringing out the race’s first caution flag.
From then on, as polesitter Lochie Hughes and Josh Pierson led the race’s first 46 laps, Rowe steadily moved up the field, getting 12th on lap 16, ninth on lap 20, sixth on lap 25 and third on lap 32.
Hughes and Pierson were fighting for the lead, but as Rowe climbed through the field, the battle was joined.
As the leaders went through lapped traffic, Rowe took advantage of the traffic and moved into second place on lap 41. Six laps later, Rowe took the lead and never looked back despite cautions for debris and an accident involving Yuven Sundaramoorthy and Salvador de Alba.
After the debris caution, Rowe pulled away from the battling drivers behind him to win by 2.2081 seconds and turning the race’s fastest lap on the final lap of the race.
“A lot of that second half of the race was just managing what I had because I had the pace to do so,” Rowe said. “That’s why I started kind of laying it down in the last couple laps because I knew if a caution came out at that point the race would end under yellow, I could just kind of send it. Yeah, glad I got the fastest lap.”
Alessandro de Tullio finished second ahead of Pierson. Niels Koolen finished fourth ahead of Max Taylor in fifth.
Christopher DeHarde has covered IndyCar racing and the Road to Indy for various outlets since 2014. In addition to open wheel racing, DeHarde has also covered IMSA and various short track racing events around Indiana. Originally from New Orleans, DeHarde moved to the Indianapolis area in 2017 to further pursue a career as a motorsports writer.
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