On his return to his usual spring date, the Long Beach Grand Prix provided one of the most disputed and entertaining editions in its history, in which three different drivers took the lead and a fourth came close to winning. The ball fell back to the side of Penske and Josef NewgardenNew leader of the championship after the collapse of Scott McLaughlin and Romain Grosjean beat a hungry for victories, completing the podium Alex Palou for the second drawer of 2022 in only three appointments.
In this article you will find the best moments of the race, both abbreviated format highlights five minutes a comprehensive summary of 30 minutes with the highlight of the race. In addition, from this event, we accompany these highlights with a series of relevance data extracted from the event: statistics, records, curiosities and much more.
– Josef Newgarden earned the 22nd win of his career, Equaling the historic 18th and Emerson Fittipaldi made Tony Bettenhausen (champion in 1951 and 1958), and his podium number 43, equaling the historic 24th made the ill-fated Dan Wheldon. As to urban or permanent circuitsIt is the 13th victory achieved, which equals him in the eleventh historical position with two other legends of the sport as Hélio Castroneves and Alex Zanardi and his 26th podium in this field.
– This is only the second time in his career that Josef Newgarden has chained two consecutive wins. The only precedent of it dates from 2017, his first season with Penske, which got wins at Toronto and Mid-Ohio as part of a second half of the year in which they won the title after finishing first or second in seven of the last 10 races. In both dual streaks, Newgarden did not start from pole in none of those races, much like Scott Dixon’s three-win streak in 2020.
– Álex Palou achieved the eleventh podium of his career in IndyCarIt is having been only one oval. He stayed close to what would have been his first victory on a street circuit, since it three wins so far have only been given permanent paths. In the case of Romain GrosjeanHis second place in Long Beach represents his fourth podium in the championship and the first off a permanent layout, although the victory still eludes him. The Frenchman, who is the fourth pilot with more podiums without victory in Formula 1 (10), is still far from that status in IndyCar, a list led by Vitor Meira with 15 podiums on 10 Geoff Brabham and Don Freeland.
– Despite its half century of successes and victories, Team Penske “only” he had started a season with two straight wins on four occasions, first in 1982 (Rick Mears in Phoenix and Atlanta). With this third consecutive win, Penske equals the start of the 2010 season (Will Power in Sao Paulo and St. Petersburg, Hélio Castroneves in Barber) and is one win away from their best start ever in 2012, when Castroneves’ win at St. Petersburg was accompanied by three wins for Power at Barber, Long Beach and Sao Paulo. Interestingly, in all these streaks, Penske’s only one-two came in the last race at Texas.
– The last two polemen (Felix Rosenqvist in Texas and Colton Herta in Long Beach) have not managed to finish the race, an unusual event that has not happened since 2014, when Sebastián Saavedra was run over at the start of the Indy GP and Ed Carpenter crashed in the Indy 500. In fact, in the last four seasons there had only been five retirements from pole in total . If the poleman also quits at Barber, it would be the first consecutive triple DNF from the pole in IndyCar since the 2003 CART season. The historical record is in six consecutive retirementswhich occurred for the fourth and final time in the 2001 Indy Racing League season.
– For the second consecutive race, there were a large number of dropouts. After the nine from Texas, a total of eight drivers did not finish the event in Long Beach. To find something similar, you have to go back to a three-race streak between the end of 2012 and beginning of 2013With nine retirements in Baltimore, ten in Fontana and eight in St. Petersburg. In addition, both Texas and Long Beach ended 18 cars, which last occurred in consecutive races in 2019 with much shorter grills 22-23 pilots.
– With his 10th place, Kyle Kirkwood It was the first of the six rookies in getting a top 10 this season. Foyt pilot ranks second in the classification of the Rookie of the Year with 38 points, four behind leader Christian Lundgaard. His partner Tatiana Calderon, Who finished in 16th place, is the seventh woman in history to compete in the Grand Prix of Long Beach and first since the 2013 edition, which was ninth Simona de Silvestro and Ana Beatriz 14th. The best results were achieved by Danica Patrick, fourth in the 2009 race and seventh in 2011.
– The new television deal in the US IndyCarPlacing 14 of the 17 races in one of the main channels of the country, is beginning to bear fruit, especially in a race like Long Beach which was reissued on a powerful channel after being relegated to cable channels from 2008. Despite stiff opposition in Golf Masters audiences, Long Beach attracted an audience of 1,078,000 viewers on NBC, the best figure for the event since 2001, and establishing the best average audience in the championship at this point since 2003. All this, before a total attendance of 187,000 spectators during the weekend, at the height of the solid pre-pandemic numbers . Figures prior to 1996 are still a long way off, but the recovery of national notoriety is on the right track.
Photos: IndyCar Media