Louis Foster avoided a Lap 1 pileup and led all 35 laps to win the INDY NXT by Firestone Grand Prix of Portland on Sunday at Portland International Raceway.
Rookie Foster, from England, started from the pole and earned his second victory of the season in the No. 26 Copart/USF Pro Championship car fielded by Andretti Autosport. He captured his first career victory in the INDYCAR development series in early July at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course.
Foster won by 7.8583 seconds over fellow rookie Nolan Siegel in the No. 39 HMD Motorsports with DCR car. Siegel earned his best finish since winning in June at Road America. Danial Frost placed third in the No. 68 HMD Motorsports with DCR machine, his best result since winning the season opener in March at St. Petersburg.
Mayhem unfolded again in Calamity Corner at Portland on Lap 1, as the cars of Reece Gold, Josh Pierson, Kyffin Simpson, McElrea, Jacob Abel and Victor Franzoni were involved in a chain-reaction collision. Rasmussen’s machine was hit from behind in the incident, damaging its floor and punting it into a spin in Turn 1, but Rasmussen was able to continue.
That incident triggered the only full-course caution of the race, and Foster had no trouble pulling away on the restart on Lap 5.
Foster expanded his gap over Frost to 2.4788 seconds by Lap 10 and 5.3202 seconds by Lap 20.
While Foster ran away out front, there was a spirited joust for second on the final lap. Siegel stayed close to Frost in the closing laps before pouncing with an outside move in the Turn 1 chicane on the final lap to take second place.
Race results (order of finish, starting position in parentheses, driver, laps completed and reason out (if any))
1/ (1) Louis Foster, 35, Running
2/ (7) Nolan Siegel, 35, Running
3/ (8) Danial Frost, 35, Running
4/ (11) Christian Bogle, 35, Running
5/ (3) Christian Rasmussen, 35, Running
6/ (16) Jamie Chadwick, 35, Running
7/ (14) Ernie Francis Jr., 35, Running
8/ (12) James Roe, 35, Running
9/ (17) Matthew Brabham, 35, Running
10/ (10) Yuven Sundaramoorthy, 34, Running
11/ (6) Victor Franzoni, 34, Running
12/ (13) Jagger Jones, 33, Running
13/ (4) Kyffin Simpson, 33, Running
14/ (5) Reece Gold, 33, Running
15/ (2) Hunter McElrea, 29, Contact
16/ (9) Jacob Abel, 0, Contact
17/ (15) Josh Pierson, 0, Contact
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