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Honda Indy 200: 3 takeaways from IndyCar at Mid-Ohio

By Brittany Frederick

LEXINGTON, OH - JULY 30: James Hinchcliffe, of Canada, drives the #5 Honda IndyCar for Schmidt Peterson Motorsports, Scott Dixon, of New Zealand, drives the #9 Honda IndyCar for Chip Ganassi Racing, and Simon Pagenaud, of France, drives the #1 Chevrolet IndyCar for Team Penske during the warm-up for the Verizon IndyCar Series Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio on July 30, 2017, at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in Lexington, OH. (Photo by Frank Jansky/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
LEXINGTON, OH - JULY 30: James Hinchcliffe, of Canada, drives the #5 Honda IndyCar for Schmidt Peterson Motorsports, Scott Dixon, of New Zealand, drives the #9 Honda IndyCar for Chip Ganassi Racing, and Simon Pagenaud, of France, drives the #1 Chevrolet IndyCar for Team Penske during the warm-up for the Verizon IndyCar Series Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio on July 30, 2017, at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in Lexington, OH. (Photo by Frank Jansky/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images) /
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What did we learn from Josef Newgarden’s dominant win in the Honda Indy 200? Here are our takeaways from the Verizon IndyCar Series race at Mid-Ohio.

Sunday’s IndyCar race at Mid-Ohio left fans with plenty to talk about. Josef Newgarden won his third race of 2017 by capturing the checkered flag in the Honda Indy 200, and as a victory prize drove away with the championship lead.

But Mid-Ohio wasn’t a one-man show, at least in terms of storylines. Scott Dixon, Will Power, Ryan Hunter-Reay and even IndyCar rookie Esteban Gutierrez gave audiences something worth discussing this weekend, and now we’re going to break it all down for you.

If you missed any of the race or to see the complete Honda Indy 200 results, click here.

Here’s what we learned from the Honda Indy 200:

1) No, seriously, Josef Newgarden is the real deal

Did any IndyCar fans not think that Josef Newgarden wouldn’t be a championship contender when he joined Team Penske? Newgarden’s 2017 IndyCar season is the season we all expected him to have once he started driving for a major team.

The only question was how quickly he would fit into the Penske system; we saw both Simon Pagenaud and Will Power need an adjustment period when they came aboard the team. But maybe since Newgarden (and everyone else) knew this was going to happen since before last season, he’s been able to jump right in and continue his upward climb toward becoming one of IndyCar’s elite.

Newgarden is now the frontrunner to win the 2017 IndyCar championship. And it’s not a stretch to think that if he gets his first title, it won’t be his last. Newgarden is one of the next faces of IndyCar both on and off the track, and honestly the league couldn’t ask for a better representative, both in how he carries himself and how well he races.

2) Esteban Gutierrez didn’t make himself any friends

Not to take anything away from Newgarden’s performance on Sunday, but he might have had to fight for the Honda Indy 200 win if not for a bewildering decision from Dale Coyne Racing. On the day’s sole restart, Coyne decided to not pull the lapped car of Esteban Gutierrez out from between Newgarden and second-place Will Power.

As a result, when the restart happened, Power had to get around Gutierrez if he wanted to keep fighting Newgarden. And any chance he had at doing that ended when the rookie Gutierrez locked up his brakes, holding up Power and Graham Rahal behind him. Newgarden would likely still have beaten Power on the strength of his car, but Power would have been in with a chance, and you can’t dismiss the hard-charging Rahal either.

Coyne claimed he left Gutierrez in line because he wanted to see his driver get his lap back, but on a crucial restart that could decide the outcome of the race is not the right time to find out what Gutierrez is made of. And given the long memory of Will Power, he won’t forget that for the rest of the season.

3)  Even teammates can disagree

The Honda Indy 200 was an interesting race for teammate-on-teammate competition. Aside from the Power vs. Newgarden battle, we had Simon Pagenaud trying to mix things up with Power, and then we had the Andretti Autosport boys.

At this point, Ryan Hunter-Reay deserves a hug and/or a stiff drink. RHR had a decent start to his race and was making moves, seemingly on his way to another strong result for the No. 28 DHL Honda team that’s had so many bad breaks in the 2017 IndyCar season. And then he got another one, in the form of teammate Alexander Rossi causing him to spin out.

There’s a disagreement as to whether Rossi made contact with Hunter-Reay or just drove in such a way that RHR was forced too far over, but Hunter-Reay wasn’t happy and with good reason. He did battle back for a decent finish but to be spun out by any driver is headache-inducing. Then to add in that it’s your own teammate? There just keep being more bumps in the road for Andretti. The IndyCar boys need some of the good luck from their Global Rallycross counterparts.

Next: Tony Kanaan talks about his future in IndyCar

The Verizon IndyCar Series takes another break next weekend and returns on Sunday, Aug. 20 at Pocono Raceway with the ABC Supply 500. Until then, for the latest IndyCar news, follow along with the Motor Sports category at FanSided here.