IndyCar: Pato O’Ward just ended a massive drought

Chevrolet is in IndyCar victory lane, and it’s not with a Team Penske driver, as Pato O’Ward secured his first career win at Texas Motor Speedway.

It was a long time coming, and it finally came on Sunday afternoon in the second of two races of the doubleheader at Texas Motor Speedway: Pato O’Ward is an IndyCar race winner.

O’Ward took the lead of the 248-lap XPEL 375 around the four-turn, 1.44-mile (2.317-kilometer) oval in Fort Worth, Texas from Team Penske’s Josef Newgarden, who drove the XPEL-sponsored #2 Chevrolet with just over 23 laps remaining, and he never looked back, winning the race by 1.2443 seconds.

O’Ward took the checkered flag behind the wheel of the #5 Chevrolet for the first time in his career in his 25th start and 18th with Arrow McLaren SP. Prior to his win, he had recorded seven top four finishes in 17 starts with the team, including three runner-up results last year en route to a fourth place finish in the championship standings in his first full season in the sport.

But even more interestingly, O’Ward ended a drought that Chevrolet had experienced since the end of the 2016 season.

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Heading into today’s race, there had been 69 races contested since this event, and 33 had been won by Chevrolet. All 33 of those wins came via Team Penske drivers.

Newgarden secured 15 of those wins while Will Power secured 10, Simon Pagenaud secured seven and Helio Castroneves secured one. Not since Scott Dixon, who is now a Honda driver following Chip Ganassi Racing’s switch back in 2017, won at Watkins Glen International in September 2016 had a Chevrolet driver competing for a team other than Team Penske won a race.

Prior to O’Ward’s win, the most recent Chevrolet win by a current Chevrolet team was Newgarden’s win for Ed Carpenter Racing at Iowa Speedway in July 2016, which was five races prior to Dixon’s win at Watkins Glen International. Team Penske and Chevrolet won three of the four races in between, two by Power and one by Pagenaud.

O’Ward, who is the first Mexican driver to win an IndyCar race since Adrian Fernandez won at Auto Club Speedway in 2004, now sits in second place in the championship standings with four races of the 17-race 2021 season in the books.

Is this a sign of things to come for O’Ward, Arrow McLaren SP and Chevrolet throughout the rest of the season? The next race on the schedule is the season’s fifth race, the GMR Grand Prix at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course, and it is set to be broadcast live on NBC beginning at 2:30 p.m. ET on Saturday, May 15.