Herta captures first win with Steinbrener in Austin
Colton Herta was able to come out on top of field in IndyCars first visit to Austin, Texas and capture the first win for Harding Steinbrenner Racing.
( palabras)
Colton Herta is 18 years and 11 month old. And not only that he just captured his very first IndyCar career victory in the series first time visit to the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas. The day started out really good already for young Colton as he would start 4th in just his third series start.
Much of the day was lead by Will Power and Alexander Rossi was always following not far back in 2nd. It was looking as it was going to come from one of the two drivers especially since they seemed to be able to still drive their race cars on older tires as where some of the other teams such as the Ganassi cars of Scott Dixon and Felix Rosenqvist would start out towards the front but fade as their Firestone's would get chewed up by the Texas asphault.
Colton Herta would be able to challenge Alexander Rossi as green flag pit stops would happen. Rossi would be on his way back on to the racing surface after pitting for service and would lock his brakes up on the exit of pit road and having to correct himself while a Colton Herta came barging into turn 1 going right around Rossi saying thank you very much and stealing the spot good for 2nd place. However it would not Rossi very long to return as when a couple laps later while going down the long back stretch he would set up Herta for a pass into the upcoming left hander and was able to take back what was his from Colton Herta with Power still leading.
How do you wins races? with a little luck and doing stuff your competition does not. The Harding Steinbrenner team tried this by being the first of the front runners to pit for new tires. And I may have said a little luck but Harding Steinbrenner team must have a pot of gold sitting in their pit box, as while on pit road a caution flew for James Hinchcliffe and Felix Rosenqvist getting together and sending Rosenqvist into the barrier. With the caution Power, Rossi and the almost the whole rest of the field would have to come in for fresh tires, this would put Herta in the catbird seat.
It seemed like even with Herta in the lead that if Will Power would be able to get out first behind Herta, Power would be able to give Herta the most challenge as he was leading almost the whole day. But while Power released his clutch to get out of his box he had a gear box issue. He had broken a input shaft and his day was done.
On the restart with about 10 laps to go Herta would lead over Josef Newgarden. And the a question was would push to pass come in to factor, Herta had only about 47 seconds remaining, while Newgarden had about 127 seconds remaining.
It was turn out to not be a factor as Colton Herta stomped on it during the restart and ran away from the field capturing his first ever IndyCar career victory and becoming the youngest series winner at 18 years and 11 months since Graham Rahal won St Petersburg in 2009 at 19 years and 3 months.
It will be intersting to see how Colton Herta will perform throughout this season with this being only his 3rd series start and getting a top 10 in the previous round in St Pete. This win puts him 2nd in points 18 behind Josef Newgarden.
Much of the day was lead by Will Power and Alexander Rossi was always following not far back in 2nd. It was looking as it was going to come from one of the two drivers especially since they seemed to be able to still drive their race cars on older tires as where some of the other teams such as the Ganassi cars of Scott Dixon and Felix Rosenqvist would start out towards the front but fade as their Firestone's would get chewed up by the Texas asphault.
Colton Herta would be able to challenge Alexander Rossi as green flag pit stops would happen. Rossi would be on his way back on to the racing surface after pitting for service and would lock his brakes up on the exit of pit road and having to correct himself while a Colton Herta came barging into turn 1 going right around Rossi saying thank you very much and stealing the spot good for 2nd place. However it would not Rossi very long to return as when a couple laps later while going down the long back stretch he would set up Herta for a pass into the upcoming left hander and was able to take back what was his from Colton Herta with Power still leading.
How do you wins races? with a little luck and doing stuff your competition does not. The Harding Steinbrenner team tried this by being the first of the front runners to pit for new tires. And I may have said a little luck but Harding Steinbrenner team must have a pot of gold sitting in their pit box, as while on pit road a caution flew for James Hinchcliffe and Felix Rosenqvist getting together and sending Rosenqvist into the barrier. With the caution Power, Rossi and the almost the whole rest of the field would have to come in for fresh tires, this would put Herta in the catbird seat.
It seemed like even with Herta in the lead that if Will Power would be able to get out first behind Herta, Power would be able to give Herta the most challenge as he was leading almost the whole day. But while Power released his clutch to get out of his box he had a gear box issue. He had broken a input shaft and his day was done.
On the restart with about 10 laps to go Herta would lead over Josef Newgarden. And the a question was would push to pass come in to factor, Herta had only about 47 seconds remaining, while Newgarden had about 127 seconds remaining.
It was turn out to not be a factor as Colton Herta stomped on it during the restart and ran away from the field capturing his first ever IndyCar career victory and becoming the youngest series winner at 18 years and 11 months since Graham Rahal won St Petersburg in 2009 at 19 years and 3 months.
It will be intersting to see how Colton Herta will perform throughout this season with this being only his 3rd series start and getting a top 10 in the previous round in St Pete. This win puts him 2nd in points 18 behind Josef Newgarden.
