Late Incident Between Newgarden and Herta Ruins Challenge; Dixon Runs Away with 57th Win

Josef Newgarden had a chance in the closing laps of the Long Beach Grand Prix on Sunday to run down Scott Dixon to win the first two races of the IndyCar regular season. Going into the hairpin, Colton Herta was following closely behind but on a different racing line. When Newgarden moved in, Herta misjudged and hit him. After having his rear tires lifted off the track, Newgarden stalled, costing him his second-place finish.

"He just misjudged it and ran into me; once I got lifted here, I went into anti-stall. I got lifted off the ground a foot or two," Newgarden said after the race. "I couldn't get going; you have to wait for the clutch to disengage and get the thing to reset. I was just stalled there for a second. I'm not going to say that we were going to get Dixon; it was very difficult for me to get the run that I needed to. That run right there I was really excited about, I think that was going to be my last chance. You never know if it would've pulled off or not."

Herta inherited second but could not run down Dixon, who saved enough fuel to drive flat out on the final lap of the street circuit.

While Herta is prepared to take the blame for the hit, he points out that Newgarden was making a wider turn than expected. The media conversations between the two drivers were much more civil than the fallout between Daniel Ricciardo and Lance Stroll early today in F1's Chinese Grand Prix.

"I misjudged it a little bit," Herta told NBC Sports."But I think he set pretty high and was cutting back in, so he was a little bit slower at apex. Ultimately, it's up to me to carry the right speed into the corner and not run into the back of people. I just misjudged it. I think he got into anti-stall out of the corner and that's what bottled him back."

The rest of the field was flabbergasted by Dixon's fuel mileage as it appears no one was close to conserving to the extent of the veteran driver.

"He was really quick," Newgarden said of Dixon. "I don't know how they were going as far as they were."

This win marks Dixon's 57th win in IndyCar and extends his streak to 20 straight years of IndyCar victories.

Behind Herta was last year's champion, Alex Palou, who completed the podium. Newgarden settled for fourth ahead of Marcus Ericsson.

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