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Texas: first for O'Ward!

Starting 5th, the Mexican was the fastest on Sunday and made the difference at the end of the race.

Published on 03/05/2021 à 01:35

Thomas Goubin

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Texas: first for O'Ward!

Pato O'Ward won the first race of his career in Race 2 of the doubleheader at Texas Motor Speedway.

The young pilot of McLaren SP took the lead on the 224th of 248 laps, passing Josef Newgarden, who had taken the lead on the 202nd lap of a race long dominated by the pole sitter and winner the day before, Scott Dixon.

By beating Newgarden by a second and 2/10ths, “Pato” gave his team its first success since Woking joined forces with Schmidt Peterson. 

Having reached the podium 4 times last season, the ambitious Mexican was still missing a victory, already on the podium the day before (3rd), and who is now in 2nd place in the championship, behind Dixon. 

Graham Rahal (RLL) took 3rd place, ahead of Scott Dixon (Chip Ganassi), while simon pagenaud (Penske), who started 8th, had a solid race to finish 6th.

The race started very badly with a huge crash during the rolling start involving eight cars at the back of the peloton, six of which did not restart. Like the day before, Sébastien Bourdais (AJ Foyt) was very unfortunate, this time hit by Pietro Fittipaldi (Dale Coye Racing), the replacement for Romain Grosjean on ovals in n°51.

After touching the Frenchman, Alexander Red went into a spin, while Conor Daly (Carlin), starting from the back row, saw his car overturn and slide several meters after being cornered by Dalton Kellett (AJ Foyt) and Ed Jones (Dale Coyne Racing). The American, well protected by the aeroscreen, escaped without damage.

Discover the report of the Texas event, in issue 2310 of AUTOhebdo, available from Monday evening in digital version and from this Wednesday on newsstands.

 

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