While one team was happy in the end at the DXC Technology 600, one driver Graham Rahal, thinks Indycar should have checked the last restart with 12 laps to go.
Simon Pagenaud was also a victim of the last restart that resulted in brake checking.
“Yeah, he did, no doubt,” Rahal said. “The brake checking from the leader (Josef Newgarden) was obscene. We were well past the start zone and yet the brake checking persisted. We would go and then bam, everyone was on the brakes. There’s no doubt I did touch him. Luckily, it was nose straight to the right rear, which didn’t cut his tire or anything, I don’t think. There’s nothing you could do, I mean that needs to be addressed in my opinion by the stewards. We had issues with this before, but it was clear. Acceleration, brake, acceleration, brake. It was ridiculous! It’s dangerous on these things.”
“If I’m not mistaken, it was the only time he (Josef Newgarden) was leading too. (Ryan) Hunter-Reay’s restart was great. Good consistent flow, you know good speed. You know, it was nice and clean. The last one I thought was ridiculous.”
While Rahal thought the last restart was not to his liking, race winner Newgarden didn’t think the restart was not wrong.
“It’s the leaders discretion on when he can go whenever he wants,” Newgarden said. “I thought I was in a fine enough position to start where I did. I mean, I don’t know what to tell him (Graham Rahal), I went when I needed to go. It’s your discretion, that’s the rule. I haven’t seen it (restart). I don’t know what happen to those guys in the back, but I went when I wanted to go. I mean, I went when I was (Turn) 4, which you’re supposed to go out of the last corner.”
Newgarden took the lead on lap 203 and led the last 46 laps, and even held on to the lead with a late race restart that came with 12 to go.
Graham Rahal finished third, rounding out the top podium finishers, while Simon Pagenaud finished sixth.
