Pato O'Ward powers to victory in a mad Milwaukee Race 2
- Evan Roberts
- 2 hours ago
- 5 min read
With a Drivers' Championship to settle and a topsy-turvy weekend schedule, Milwaukee was always bound to be full of drama. Despite all its talk, the championship battle was far from the most compelling story of the race. The race for the win was intense with over 10 different leaders, but taking the checkered flag first was Pato O'Ward, who claimed his second win of the season.
Joining him on the podium were Scott McLaughlin and Christian Lundgaard, who picked up his first podium on an oval.
Race Report
Leading the field to green, pole sitter Alex Palou had the perfect start. The Spaniard pulled four car lengths on the rest of the field before deciding that wasn't quite enough and proceeded to put another 2.5 seconds to his nearest opponent, Josef Newgarden in only 10 laps.
As ever in Milwaukee, the high line on the opening laps provided opportunity for those towards the back of the field. Two who made the most of this were Romain Grosjean and Kyle Kirkwood, the former making up ten places as he sat 10th. As for the latter, a terrible 24th-place grid spot as a result of his bizarre practice crash meant it could only really get better.
Whilst the rest of the drivers squabbled, it left a chance for Palou to further stretch his legs. After 20 laps, the gap was over four seconds. With it being a short oval, that was never likely to last, as the ever-existent issue of lapped traffic reared its head once again. Over the ten laps that followed, both Newgarden and O'Ward closed the gap to within a second of Palou.
By the time they caught Palou, he looked vulnerable. Despite being an oval specialist, Newgarden has never won at Milwaukee. Taking that stat as a challenge, the American made light work of Palou in a decisive move to the inside.
Just after the overtake, the first caution of the day came out on Lap 36 as Grosjean spun coming out of Turn 2; he did not make any contact. When the pits did eventually open, all drivers bar Caio Collet took to change tyres. In the pit lane chaos, it was Palou who benefited and moved back into the lead as Newgarden was slow out of his box due to being held up by Nolan Siegel. As for O'Ward, who entered in third, he had a nightmare stop with a wheel not fitting properly, dropping him into the mid-pack.
When Palou once again led the field to green, there was a similar result; he cleared off. Behind him, there was plenty of action. The battle for third was the most engaging; Mick Schumacher, Louis Foster, McLaughlin and Rinus VeeKay were the drivers involved in a multi-lap battle that saw each driver hold the position at a stage. Despite a sketchy three-wide moment, all drivers made it through safely, with VeeKay eventually claiming the position for good.
Elsewhere, having made early moves, Kirkwood found himself firmly within the Top 10 and challenging McLaughlin for sixth by Lap 60. In the laps that followed, catching was one thing, but passing was a different story. Build-up off line and drivers getting into their groove meant getting through was going to be difficult.
It certainly seemed nobody told VeeKay, as he continued his fine race by passing Newgarden for second. With the American off line, Lundgaard in fourth place gladly took advantage and made his way into third.
Similarly to the first stint, Palou would quickly catch the back of the pack. As it was the first time, his struggle to get past lapped traffic continued. Over a couple of laps, his advantage went from five seconds to only one. Just as it seemed a battle was on the cards, the second phase of stops started. Once it did start, every driver stopped within Five Laps.
First was Newgarden, then the following lap came the majority of drivers, bar Palou, who stayed out an extra few laps. When he emerged from the pits, Palou still maintained the lead but had Newgarden and VeeKay on his tail.
The Dutchman was the one who took advantage of the situation as he stalked Palou for a few laps before making a decisive move around the outside to take the lead. Another driver doing the same was Kirkwood, who had superior pace in dirty air as he made his way into the Top 5 before passing fourth and third like they were standing still.
The next round of stops came around Lap 123, where Team Penske cars were the first to stop once again. Whilst that was happening, Palou made his way back past VeeKay and into the lead. With the undercut so powerful, all three Penskes made big position gains and ended up third, fourth and fifth when everything shook out. As if from nowhere, David Malukas was the one making major gains and moved himself all the way up to second.
The big losers from the round of stops were VeeKay and Kirkwood, who dropped back outside of the Top 5.
Things were worse for Newgarden, as on Lap 142 he would bring the second caution of the day out with a spin coming out of the final corner. This time, there was contact with the wall.
With the caution came another flurry of pit stops. Interestingly, everyone bar McLaughlin and Scott Dixon took the opportunity to change tyres. In those stops, a rare mistake for Chip Ganassi Racing saw Palou lose the lead to Power after a brilliant Andretti Global stop.
Before any restart shenanigans could get underway, the race went straight back to caution as Grosjean had his second spin of the race out of the last corner. Unlike earlier in the race, he was not able to save it and found himself hard in the wall.
On the eventual restart, there was plenty of drama. The leader once again made a strong restart; McLaughlin held a good gap, but all of the fight came behind. Both Power and Lundgaard were making moves, and by the time Lap 175 came around, they both used their far fresher tyres to get past McLaughlin.
The biggest losers from this restart were Palou, Malukas and Kirkwood. All dropped positions yet stayed in the Top 10.
With the poor restart, all three made early stops and utilised the undercut well to move back up to challenging for the podium spots. The major moment from this pit cycle was when race leader Power threw away the lead with a drive-through penalty for speeding in the pit lane, dropping him well outside the Top 10.
What this meant was that as the stint shook out, it was O'Ward at the front of the field with a useful gap to his nearest competitors, McLaughlin and Lundgaard. Whilst those top three created a gap to the drivers behind Malukas and Palou were involved in an intense battle. Malukas eventually made the pass on Palou, who was being told he needed to make it to the end.
Then O'Ward started catching the back end of the Top 10, lapping them was proving more difficult, and the gap at the front was closing, but the Mexican stayed calm and efficiently made his way past each car one by one to win the race. Completing the podium were McLaughlin and Lundgaard, who held off a late charge from Malukas.
Top 10
Pato O'Ward
Scott McLaughlin
Christian Lundgaard
David Malukas
Alex Palou
Kyle Kirkwood
Rinus VeeKay
Christian Rasmussen
Marcus Ericsson
Louis Foster
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