Remember how this morning we wrote about how Will Power’s year-long winless streak may be causing some friction in the Team Penske camp? Between Power and Juan Pablo Montoya, in particular? And how if Power could win a race probably everything would be, as we say in Tennessee, copacetic?
Well, that’s just what happened this afternoon, as Power made a gutsy but clean move around teammate Simon Pagenaud to take the second race of the Chevrolet Dual in Detroit IndyCar race at Belle Isle.
Pageneaud was second, Ryan Hunter-Reay was third, Josef Newgarden was fifth, Alexander Rossi was 12th.
Fellow Penske driver Helio Castroneves might have won had he not been caught by an inopportune caution flag; he was 14th.
And as for Montoya, who finished third yesterday, and said that Power was getting desperate, and consequently reckless, out of frustration: He finished 20 of the 22 cars, after hitting the wall on cold tires all by himself. Which is where Power finished yesterday after a wheel nut came loose. Along with his first-car-out performance at the Indianapolis 500, this is the second time in three races Montoya has let a dumb mistake end his day.
For the IndyCar series, it’s off to Texas Motor Speedway next weekend.