Hauger wins Detroit Indy Nxt race bookended by incidents

Photo: Joe Skibinski

Dennis Hauger won the Indy Nxt race in Detroit after a lap one incident took multiple drivers out of contention.

Accidents bookended the race, as a caution period in the final laps led to a one lap dash to the flag.

Hauger, who had a lead of 13 seconds before the pace car was brought out, held off Caio Collet to claim his fourth win of the season.

Contact between Callum Hedge and Myles Rowe triggered a multi-car incident at turn four on the opening lap. Rowe was sent into a spin and collected other cars who had nowhere to go on the tight street circuit. Max Taylor, who was swamped at the start, was caught up in the incident, along with Jordan Missig and Tommy Smith. 

The incident prompted a red flag after just one lap while cars were cleared. 

When the race restarted, Rowe, Smith, Liam Sceates, Nolan Allaer, Hailie Deegan and Ricardo Escotto remained in the pits. Taylor and Escotto would not make it back out.

Racing resumed with Hauger ahead of Lochie Hughes and Salvador de Alba. The latter two Andretti cars battled for position, but Hauger wasn’t quite able to shake them in the opening lap. As Hughes and de Alba swapped positions, they made slight contact which caused slight damage to Hughes’ front wing. De Alba then tagged a wall, causing damage to his own front wing.

Hughes and de Alba continued to battle, allowing Hauger to escape at the front of the field and bringing Collet into the fight. De Alba was eventually told to pit as the front wing damage became too significant.

A few laps of battling with Collet later and Hughes’ front wing was also close to breaking away. He came into the pits just after losing second to Collet.

Hauger now had a gap of over 12 seconds to Collet. The gap closed as the pair made their way through extensive backmarker traffic, but Hauger eventually began to pull away again.

He was close to 13 seconds clear of Collet when Missig put his nose into the tyre barriers while attacking Seb Murray. Missig was able to get going again, but not before the pace car hit the track.

That left one lap of green running to the flag. Hauger got a good restart and quickly pulled out of reach of Collet, finishing 1.0460s ahead.

Juan Manuel Correa avoided the drama to climb up to third in just his third start, ahead of Josh Pierson and Hughes, who passed Murray for fifth on the final lap.

Jack William Miller was the first of the lapped cars, finishing seventh. De Alba recovered to finish eighth, ahead of Niels Koolen and Bryce Aron.

Myles Rowe, who was third in the championship going into the race, came in and out of the pits multiple times and eventually had to retire after completing just 10 laps.

Race results (45 laps)