With the biggest month of the IndyCar season finally here, tomorrow will serve as the opening act for the Indy 500 on May 26. The Indianapolis Grand Prix will be run for the sixth time on Saturday in its combined road course setup of using part of the oval track along with the road course in the infield. Will Power has won the race three times and is the two-time defending winner, while also winning pole in each race win in 2015, 2017 and 2018.
Simon Pagenaud is the only other driver to win at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Road Course. One came in 2014 in the inaugural event with Sam Schmidt Motorsports, and the other was in his championship-winning season with Penske in 2016. Penske has won four of the five Indy Grand Prix’s. After running 82 laps around the 2.4 mile course for the first three years, the race distance was increased to 85 laps in 2017-18 before growing to 90 laps for Saturday’s race.
Josef Newgarden has a 28-point lead atop the standings after four races through the best opening stretch of results in his career. However, the Indy GP has been one of his least successful tracks in his seven-plus years in the series. He’s never even finished within the top-10, finishing 11th the past two years after finishing 17th or worse in his first three appearances. Two seasons ago he suffered a pit limiter problem that made him serve multiple penalties late in the race, and last year he made a risky move trying to take third place from Sebastien Bourdais in the second half of the race before hitting the curb and spinning out. With one setback coming from mechanics and one from questionable driving, Newgarden needs to run a tidy race to keep his championship lead as they enter the double-points weekend on May 26.
Alexander Rossi is the only driver besides Newgarden to finish in the top-10 in every race this season, while the other contenders have each had at least one poor result to create the sizable gap to Newgarden this early in the season. But just like any season in IndyCar, one early mistake can make a lead go from feeling dominant to extremely vulnerable in a single weekend.
Race Predictions
Pole: Will Power
1st: Will Power
2nd: Ryan Hunter-Reay
3rd: Scott Dixon
While I’ve picked Power on my podium three times this season and it’s only came through once, there is no other track besides St. Petersburg that I’d feel more confident in his ability to run away with the weekend. Power has gone through a bit of a slump the past three races, which always seems to lead to successful stretches like his domination last year by completing the Indy-double of reigning victorious in the Indy GP and Indy 500.
Hunter-Reay has had a quietly strong start to the season after having his engine blow in the opening race, and he sits at fifth in the standings after three top-10 results. He’s finished on two podiums at IMS before, and I expect him to be able to race Power hard throughout the weekend as one of the leaders for Honda. Dixon has finished runner-up to Power the past two races at this track, and he should also be in contention in the closing stages of Saturday’s race.
I could see a scenario where Newgarden or Rossi have their first setback of the year after a run of limited problems in the opening months of the season. Look for Colton Herta to bounce back after two lackluster results after winning at COTA in the second race of the year. Last season he swept the two Indy Lights races at the Indy GP.
Race: Saturday, May 11 at 2:30 p.m. CST, NBC
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