Pato O'Ward won the Iowa 2 GP that was marked by Josef Newgarden's crash and now hopes to put together a good sequence of results in the final stretch of the Indy season
Pato O'Ward took advantage of a crash by then-leader Josef Newgarden to win the Iowa 2 GP on Sunday afternoon. Starting in seventh place, the Mexican started off strong and quickly established himself in third position. Pato managed to overtake Will Power in the pits and then took the lead after the other Penske crashed. The Mexican pointed to the work done by McLaren in the pits as the main responsible for his second win of the year.
"The work in the pit-stops was incredible, I think that's what gave us the win. Obviously, I did my part in the car to keep us safe. I knew we had a good pace, but it's hard when you have so much traffic, so every lap is different," said O'Ward after the race at the Iowa oval.
"I'm very excited, very happy, we knew we had a good car, so it was just about capitalizing and being there at the right time. The team did a great job of picking the times to go into the pits and it was very enjoyable. It was a great weekend," concluded the Mexican, who finished the first race on Saturday in second position.
On a short oval of only 1.4 kilometers, with laps around 20 seconds, knowing how to deal with traffic is key to success. This was another important point of the race on Sunday, and Pato felt that the rails were not making life easy for those coming faster behind.
"Nobody was going to listen anyway. 'Pick a track, the others will let you pass' and no! They don't care. The best you can do in that scenario is to get around in your own way. We passed them nice and smooth," said the McLaren driver.
As a result, O'Ward has 367 points and has closed the gap to championship leader Marcus Ericsson of Ganassi, Sweden, to 36 points. With only five races left in the Indy season, the Mexican hopes that the great weekend in Iowa will serve to pack the team for the final stretch of 2022.
"I hope we can win a few more, that would be fantastic. I think we've had a good year so far, but we've wasted two wins in the last few months. So it's definitely been frustrating weeks, but rewarding ones as well. This is the perfect momentum we need going into August and September, and obviously closing out the month of July in Indianapolis next week," said Pato.
Indy returns next Sunday (31st), for the Indianapolis GP 2, at the mixed circuit of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.