Photo: Penske Entertainment / James Black
Indy Nxt’s season finale at Nashville Superspeedway two weekends ago was action-packed, particularly in an area which left two leading drivers surprised.
The 65-lap race featured 81 on-track passes for position and 26 for places in the top five. Abel Motorsports with Force Indy’s Myles Rowe contributed to that tally as he charged from ninth to victory.
Key to his progress was using the high line, which offered higher speeds but was an unknown.
“I was honestly really surprised with how the high line was working today. You could really run it really well,” he said.
“You could keep a nose up and get some air in without really feeling like the car was going to do much. Even with the tyre wear. [Turns] three and four was more sketchy than one and two, but with the right patience and timing you could manage the platform and get through a car length up high with honestly no problem.
“I think the driver tools and how I was messing with my bars to keep the platform and controlling the oversteer played a huge part. And I was honestly shocked with how it worked. But once I realised that you could do that, I just made sure to take advantage of it while other people weren’t.”
Andretti Global’s Dennis Hauger started and finished third, but had to recover lost ground after dropping to sixth early on. His maiden superspeedway experience left him shocked by the potential in race trim.
“It was so different [to other ovals],” he beamed post-race. “In the middle of the race I was like ‘holy shit, this is crazy’. It’s so intense. I think people were side-by-side for like four or five laps at some point, and the high line was getting more and more dirty.
“When I got past Lochie [Hughes], for example, I was really hanging on on the top there, and it was working well.”
Hauger called it a “cool experience” featuring “a couple of intense moments going side-by-side” and “probably the race I’ve learned the most about the ovals” with his most high line running yet.
“[I learned to] try different lines, get up to the high line and work it and use it. All the way through the race I was trying different things, trying different lines, and I experimented with it with the tools I had in the car as well.”
He added to Formula Scout: “I was surprised [by that grip] looking at the IndyCar guys yesterday. They were actually crashing when they were going up to the high line, some of them. So I wasn’t sure how it was going to be, but it worked pretty well. Especially in the start when they got the track gripped.”
“It was getting harder towards middle, end of the race, at least for me. It was not too bad in [turns] one and two, it was pretty good there, but three and four was just getting a bit too risky at some point.”