McLaughlin holds off Palou for Mid-Ohio Indy victory

IndyCar

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Scott McLaughlin scored his second career IndyCar win and second victory of the season at the Mid-Ohio Indy 200 ahead of Alex Palou.

The win ends a slump for the Team Penske driver, who had dropped down the IndyCar Series points table since winning the opening round at St. Petersburg, Florida, and finishing a close second at Texas Motor Speedway.

Polesitter Patricio O’Ward dominated the first stint of the race, leading the first 28 laps from the front of the field, just ahead of McLaughlin. But before making his first pit stop, he reported an engine issue to his McLaren SP team.

O’Ward would nurse a fuel pickup problem thereafter until his car finally broke down at the exit of pit lane during a full-course caution. He retired after completing 52 laps, and McLaren SP ended their day with a double retirement after Felix Rosenqvist suffered a mechanical failure on lap nine.

The benefactor was McLaughlin, who started second and moved up into the lead by making his first pit stop just before the Safety Car was called for Kyle Kirkwood going off at turn eight.

Once he assumed the lead, McLaughlin went on to lead 45 laps, and in the final laps he withstood pressure from reigning IndyCar champion Alex Palou.

With his mother and father finally able to see their son win in IndyCar, McLaughlin scored the victory, just ahead of Palou in second – exactly as it was in St. Petersburg.

Will Power, who started all the way down in 21st, then dropped to 27th and last after spinning out on the first green flag lap, charged his way back through the field. Using a three-stop strategy, Power went on to finish in third place.

Rinus VeeKay, who pulled off a remarkable double overtake around Scott Dixon and Josef Newgarden on lap 40, finished in fourth, ahead of Dixon in fifth, championship leader Marcus Ericsson in sixth, and Newgarden in seventh.

Helio Castroneves finished eighth, with rookie David Malukas in ninth, and Simon Pagenaud in tenth rounding out the top ten.

Meanwhile, the quartet of Andretti Autosport drivers were embroiled in a number of incidents. Alexander Rossi and Romain Grosjean made contact through the Keyhole (turn two) which sent Grosjean into the tyre barriers. The Frenchman then hit Colton Herta from behind, picking up a drive-through penalty for avoidable contact when he sent the young American driver spinning off at the Keyhole. Herta, who was in contention for a podium finish for most of the race, had dropped down the order after being caught out by a caution on lap 54.

Simultaneously, Rossi would pick up the same penalty for hitting Devlin DeFrancesco and pushing the rookie off-track. Herta would be the highest-finishing Andretti driver in 15th.

There were five retirements in the race: Rosenqvist and O’Ward, along with AJ Foyt Racing team mates Kirkwood and Tatiana Calderon, who came to a stop and brought out the caution on lap 54. Callum Ilott retired from the race due to a mechanical failure, after running in the top ten for most of the day.

After nine rounds, Indy 500 winner Ericsson still leads the drivers’ standings on 321 points. Power is just 20 points back after his comeback drive to finish third. Newgarden trails by 34 points, and Palou is just 35 points back. O’Ward remains fifth in the table, but missed out on an opportunity to gain ground on Ericsson.

The IndyCar Series resumes in two weeks’ time when the series makes its long-awaited return to Exhibition Place in Toronto in Canada on July 17th.

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Indy 200 results

PositionCarDriverTeamEngine
13Scott McLaughlinPenskeChevrolet
210Alex PalouGanassiHonda
312Will PowerPenskeChevrolet
421Rinus VeeKayCarpenterChevrolet
59Scott DixonGanassiHonda
68Marcus EricssonGanassiHonda
72Josef NewgardenPenskeChevrolet
86Helio CastronevesMeyer ShankHonda
918David MalukasCoyne/HMDHonda
1060Simon PagenaudMeyer ShankHonda
1130Christian LundgaardRLLHonda
1215Graham RahalRLLHonda
1320Conor DalyCarpenterChevrolet
1451Takuma SatoCoyne/RWRHonda
1526Colton HertaAndrettiHonda
1648Jimmie JohnsonGanassiHonda
1729Devlin DeFrancescoAndretti SteinbrennerHonda
1816Simona de SilvestroParettaChevrolet
1927Alexander RossiAndrettiHonda
2045Jack HarveyRLLHonda
2128Romain GrosjeanAndrettiHonda
224Dalton KellettFoytChevrolet
2377Callum IlottJuncos HollingerChevrolet
245Pato O’WardMcLaren SPChevrolet
2511Tatiana CalderonFoytChevrolet
2614Kyle KirkwoodFoytChevrolet
277Felix RosenqvistMcLaren SPChevrolet

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Author information

RJ O'Connell
Motorsport has been a lifelong interest for RJ, both virtual and ‘in the carbon’, since childhood. RJ picked up motorsports writing as a hobby...

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11 comments on “McLaughlin holds off Palou for Mid-Ohio Indy victory”

  1. Team Herta has become the Ferrari of IndyCar. Another massive blunder with a car worthy of winning. Some weeks its the strategy, sometimes its the driver, but they cannot stop tripping over themsleves.

    Herta’s pursuit of that superlicense just got even tougher.

    1. Has Ferrari been as bad as you think? They are second fastest team in race pace and in second position. They are doing well this year and the season is still young

      1. Oh no, I don’t disagree that Ferrari are the 2nd best team, they’re very good, but it’s they’ve also given a LOT of points away this season. Many on reliability, but also cases like Monaco and Britian where the strategy calls lost them positions and points.

        That’s where my comparison to Herta comes in. They’re P10 when they have the car and driver to be P3. Herta should have had a podium today but the team botched a pit call, sending them to the back with no time to recover. Just frustrating to watch…

    2. @nerrticus Correction, I think you meant to say Team Herta has become the Haas of Indy car.

      What I saw on Sunday looked a lot like Haas F1 a couple of seasons ago. They both even have the same driver.

  2. Great win by scott

  3. CD (@clipperdael)
    4th July 2022, 6:56

    I’m ready for the inevitable Rossi/Grosjean fistfight.

    1. Haha, yeah, that was some action between them :)

  4. I obviously missed the memo from Sky Sports that the IndyCar had been shunted off of the Sky F1 channel. They finally tuned in for the last 5 laps and no post race.

  5. Massive comeback for Power, down as the last driver and still finished at the podium.

    Anyone with an idea why Andretti signed Kirkwood – all he does is run off when they drive real tracks and not ovals.

    1. AJ Foyt just haven’t produced competitive cars for nearly a decade. 11 top 5 finishes and 2 podiums since their last win at Long Beach in 2013. Kyle has shown speed driving for them, as he did yesterday – I’d take a young fast driver in his rookie season, despite the results not being there yet. It’s too early to tell, so giving him some decent equipment will answer whether he’s a good option or not.

      That said, Andretti are only taking him as Alex Rossi decided to move on – I’m not sure he would have gone to any of the other top 4 teams if Rossi had decided to stay.

  6. That was a very entertaining race. Congrats to McLaughlin on a nice drive. Team meetings at Andretti should be quite interesting for a while.

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