IndyCar: Josef Newgarden is a man on a mission

By Asher Fair | Apr 12, 2019

FORT WORTH, TX - JUNE 08: Josef Newgarden, driver of the #1 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, stands on the grid during the US Concrete Qualifying Day for the Verizon IndyCar Series DXC Technology 600 at Texas Motor Speedway on June 8, 2018 in Fort Worth, Texas. (Photo by Robert Laberge/Getty Images) /

Josef Newgarden has been nothing short of a man on a mission through the first three races of the 2019 IndyCar season, and that doesn’t look like it will change.

Josef Newgarden earned the opportunity of a lifetime in the form of Team Penske signing him to replace Juan Pablo Montoya as the driver of the #2 Chevrolet ahead of the 2017 IndyCar season, and he converted that opportunity into winning his first career IndyCar championship.

Newgarden entered the 17-race 2017 season, his sixth season as a full-time IndyCar driver, having earned three victories in his career, all in the 2015 and 2016 seasons. He more than doubled his career win total with four victories in the 2017 season en route to becoming the first American IndyCar champion since Ryan Hunter-Reay won the title in the 2012 season.

Newgarden went on to win an additional three races in the 17-race 2018 season, but he wasn’t the same as a whole, and he really wasn’t even close. After finishing on the podium in a career-high nine races in his championship-winning 2017 season, he failed to finish on the podium when he wasn’t the race winner last year.

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His top non-win finishes of the 2018 season were his fourth place finishes in the races at Iowa Speedway and Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course. He ultimately finished in fifth in the championship standings and had pretty much no mathematical chance of winning the championship heading into the double points-paying season finale at Sonoma Raceway.

But the 28-year-old Hendersonville, Tennessee native has opened up the 17-race 2019 season by proving that he is not messing around and by proving that he is eager to become the first driver to win his second IndyCar championship since Dario Franchitti won his second title back in the 2009 season.

Despite the fact that the streets of St. Petersburg, Florida had statistically been one of his worst tracks, Newgarden started this year’s race at the venue in second place before leading 60 of its 110 laps and winning it in dominant fashion. He then finished in second in the season’s second race at Circuit of the Americas, which had never previously hosted an IndyCar race.

But then at the track that had statistically been his best, Barber Motorsports Park, Newgarden qualified in a disappointing 16th place for the race. He had won the race in three of the last four seasons, including the last two, and he finished in third in the race at the track that he did not win during this four-year span.

Despite the fact that he did not have a car that was capable of winning the race, Newgarden worked his way into the top five late before making an aggressive pass on Andretti Autosport’s Alexander Rossi for fourth place, a move that Newgarden even apologized to Rossi for making.

Newgarden went on to finish this race in fourth place to open up a 27-point (125 to 98) lead in the championship standings over Chip Ganassi Racing’s Scott Dixon in second.

Through the season’s first three races, Newgarden’s average finishing position is a series-high 2.33. Dixon’s is the second best among all drivers, and his is nowhere close to Newgarden’s at 5.67.

Also through the season’s first three races, Newgarden is one of two drivers who have finished each race in the top 10. Rossi, like Newgarden, has actually finished all three of these races in the top nine.

The (major) difference is that Newgarden’s worst finish of fourth place is better than Rossi’s best finish, as Rossi finished these three races in fifth, ninth and fifth, respectively. Rossi sits in fourth in the championship standings with an an average finishing position of 6.33, which is worse than only the finishing positions of Newgarden and Dixon.

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Is Josef Newgarden on his way to winning what would be the second championship of his IndyCar career and his second title in the last three seasons? With only three races having been completed so far this season, 14 races still remain on the schedule, including two double points-paying races, but it is clear that he has established himself as the early favorite.