Herta makes all right moves to win wet, wild IndyCar GP

As Colton INDIANAPOLIS — Herta set up his winning pass Saturday, all he could see were red flashing lights. He still charged forward. The 22-year-old California driver quickly darted to the inside of Pato O’Ward on a late restart, took the lead for good with nine laps to go and beat Simon Pagenaud to the finish line by 3.0983 seconds to win a wild, wacky, wet IndyCar Grand Prix.

“Pure talent,” Herta joked when asked how he persevered for his first win of the season despite the incredibly challenging weather conditions. “The most interesting thing is you never have a car that handles great in the wet and great in the dry, but it happened today.”

Getting to victory lane certainly wasn’t easy for Herta, who earned his first Indy win in his 10th series start at the track. He also became the first Honda driver to reach victory lane this season.

After qualifying 14th on the 27-car grid, he made the gutsy choice to switch from rain tires to dry tires just three laps into the race. While he initially struggled to keep the cold tires on the track and nearly spun out on Lap 4 when he got sideways in the 10th turn on the 14-turn, 2.439-mile road course, Herta never flinched.

Somehow he hung on, quickly taking the lead and advantage of a move that allowed him to go from 15th to first. He stayed near the front of the pack the rest of the race, leading 50 of 75 laps in a two-hour race that had just 53 minutes, 22 seconds of green flag time.

It came on a day race strategists and drivers were constantly changing plans because of rain or the threat of rain. And even when it appeared Herta made the wrong choice — like running on dry tires after Alexander Rossi and made an early switch back to rain tires — things worked out.

“What I said is with the track conditions right now it’s probably wets, but it you think it’s going to be dry we’ll go with slicks,” Herta said referring to the first of two late pit stops. “Immediately when I got out there, I knew it was going to be tough so we came back in. Luckily, everybody followed our lead and did the wrong thing so we didn’t lose too many spots.”