Will Power ended his 12-month IndyCar win drought with a decisive green flag manoeuvre on Penske team-mate Simon Pagenaud to win the second street race in Detroit.
Pagenaud maintained a comfortable start from pole position in his Dallara-Chevrolet and looked set to dominate the pace from the front, maintaining first place during the opening pitstops.
But after changing onto the harder black Firestone tyres the championship leader couldn’t maintain a race winning pace, first being hounded by Tony Kanaan, who brought the gap down to less than a second before Juan Pablo Montoya triggered a yellow flag with a kick of oversteer that bumped him into the Turn 8 wall.
On the restart Power had the warmer tyres and could make a decisive pass on Pagenaud on the outside of Turn 3.
It proved to be a race-deciding move, though with other cars having stayed out it initially left Power in fifth behind Detroit race one winner Sebastien Bourdais, Charlie Kimball, Graham Rahal and Indianapolis 500 winner Alexander Rossi, who all needed to pit for a splash of fuel in the dying laps.
Once the top four cycled out for their stops, Power was able to hold off Pagenaud and top Dallara-Honda driver Ryan Hunter-Reay to claim the chequered flag and a first win since last year’s Indianapolis road course race.
Josef Newgarden and Scott Dixon ran largely quiet races to bring home solid points in fourth and fifth.
Helio Castroneves had threatened to take his first win in two years when he passed Pagenaud on lap 41 of 70, but despite building a lead, an awkwardly timed yellow flag for the static Jack Hawksworth meant the 41-year-old was forced to pit under the yellow flags and exited into the pack.
Castroneves eventually finished 14th.
An opening-lap incident at the first corner took out James Hinchcliffe and former Marussia Formula 1 driver Max Chilton, when Kimball squeezing Carlos Munoz shunted Hinchcliffe into the wall, prompting a train reaction that also claimed Chilton’s race.
Marco Andretti and Takuma Sato also suffered in the incident, but did well to recover to ninth and 10th respectively.
