IndyCar: Lost victory at COTA set tone for Will Power’s 2019 season

By Asher Fair | Jul 27, 2019

FORT WORTH, TEXAS - JUNE 07: Will Power of Australia, driver of the #12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, prepares to drive during practice for the NTT IndyCar Series - DXC Technology 600 at Texas Motor Speedway on June 07, 2019 in Fort Worth, Texas. (Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images) /

The victory that Will Power had in his grasp to take the lead of the IndyCar championship standings at Circuit of the Americas and how it eluded him effectively set the tone for his 2019 season.

Coming off of a third place finish in the 2019 IndyCar season opener on the streets of St. Petersburg, Florida after starting from the pole position and leading several laps, Team Penske’s Will Power took the pole position for the inaugural race at Circuit of the Americas.

He dominated the early stages of the 60-lap race around the 20-turn, 3.427-mile (5.515-kilometer) Circuit of the Americas natural terrain road course in Austin, Texas, leading its first 45 laps and putting himself in a position to take the lead of the championship standings.

But while several drivers had made their second pit stops of the race by lap 44, Power had not, and that’s when Arrow Schmidt Peterson Motorsports’ James Hinchcliffe and Chip Ganassi Racing rookie Felix Rosenqvist were involved in a wreck that caused the race’s one and only caution flag period.

As a result, Power and several of the other frontrunners were forced to pit during this caution flag period, which would cycle them to the back of the field on lap 47. But Power’s #12 Chevrolet experienced a driveshaft issue, and he was unable to pull away from his pit stall following his pit stop. He was forced to retire from the race, and after dominating it, he had to settle for a 24th (last) place finish.

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Unfortunately for the 38-year-old Australian, this result effectively set the tone for his 2019 season.

Power’s situation is almost like that of Scuderia Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc in Formula 1. Leclerc dominated the season’s second race, the Bahrain Grand Prix, before an engine failure turned a 10-second lead into a third place finish.

The 21-year-old Monegasque has had several opportunities since then to secure the first victory of his career, but he simply hasn’t been able to break through even though it looked like Bahrain International Circuit would play host to his first career victory on Sunday, March 31.

In Power’s case, he proceeded to spin out in the race at Barber Motorsports Park, and he cost himself a chance at winning the Indianapolis 500 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway by hitting one of his pit crew members, resulting in him being sent to the back of the pack. He did manage to rebound to finish in fifth place.

Power worked his way up into the top five after starting in 12th place in the first of two races at the Raceway on Belle Isle, but when he made his pit stop, he left the pits with a loose wheel, a wheel that came off the car as he exited the pits. He finished in 18th.

The second race at the Raceway on Belle Isle appeared poised to be just as disastrous. Yet after he was involved in an opening lap incident and stopped in the middle of the track shortly thereafter when his car simply died, he managed to rally for a season-high third place finish.

That’s just the kind of year it’s been for him.

Power then recorded his worst qualifying effort in any race in more than four years at Texas Motor Speedway, a track at which he had previously taken three pole positions. He started the race in 15th place and finished one lap off the lead in a disappointing ninth. He was never even close to being a factor, something that can rarely be said about him, especially at this particular track.

Power then set a new season-high finish with his second place finish in the race at Road America, but he finished 28.4391 seconds behind race winner Alexander Rossi of Andretti Autosport, the largest gap between the winner and the second place finisher in an IndyCar race since the 2009 season.

Three weeks later in the next race on the streets of Toronto, Power caused both of the race’s caution flag periods, one on the opening lap and one on the final lap, en route to an 18th place finish.

The following week, he threw away a chance for a podium finish at Iowa Speedway with an improper pit lane entry late in the race. After leading 49 of the race’s 300 laps and spending pretty much the entire race in the top three, he finished in 15th, one lap off the lead lap.

The only thing shocking about what has been Power’s worst season as a full-time driver for Team Penske is the fact that he is somehow still in fifth place in the championship standings. While fifth in the standings is something that many drivers would jump at the chance to secure, his position in the standings has come via a season full of struggles, and looking back, the tone for that was set at Circuit of the Americas.

On a side note, even with all of this considered, there is still certainly too much of a big deal being made over Power’s 14-race win drought. He has been the most successful driver of the last decade with 31 race victories, including an Indy 500 win, and a championship, yet even in the last seven years alone, he has gone on two win droughts of over one year in length.

There is no reason to panic because he hasn’t won a race since late last August and he could very well be in the midst of a third. He has been here before.

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Tomorrow’s IndyCar race is set to take place at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, one of the few tracks at which Will Power has not previously won. Can he turn what has been a disastrous 2019 season around in this race? Tune in to NBC at 4:00 p.m. ET for the live broadcast of it to find out.