Takuma Sato redeems himself with thrilling Gateway win over Carpenter

Takuma Sato silenced the naysayers after last week’s crash at Pocono to win the Bommarito Automotive Group 500 in a thrilling .0399s photo finish over Ed Carpenter.

Polesitter Josef Newgarden outdid Sebastien Bourdais on the green flag while Alexander Rossi got a jump in the middle of the field as Ryan Hunter-Reay and Sato made slight contact further back heading into Turn 1.

The field settled down on the backstretch until Marcus Ericsson spun coming off Turn 4 which brought out the caution flag.

Newgarden was uncatchable on the restart on the Lap 5 restart as Will Power leapfrogged Bourdais with Santino Ferrucci following to take over the third spot.

The Hendersonville, Tennesee native slowly grew a comfortable 2.45 second lead over Power feathered while Ferrucci closely trailed the pair in third. Lapped traffic further in the run slowly closed the gap as the first round of pitstops approached.

Takuma Sato kicked off the first round of stops on Lap 45 while the first of the top-five runners to pit was Scott Dixon on Lap 50. The Penske Pair pitted in succession on Laps 51 and 52 which promoted Ferrucci to the lead before his obligatory stop.

Newgarden emerged as the leader, but Power got off-line in Turn 3 and was a passenger into the wall at that point.

The yellow was fortuitous for James Hinchcliffe, who had just pitted right before the yellow. That moved Dale Coyne Racing teammates Ferrucci and Bourdais second and third ahead of Newgarden in fourth while Scott Dixon went behind the wall with a broken radiator.

Hinchcliffe brought the field to green on Lap 69 with the lapped car of Charlie Kimball cushioning his lead over Ferrucci and Newgarden.

The Woodbury, Connecticut driver broke that buffer heading into Turn 1 by dispatching Kimball without issue while DCR teammate Sebastien Bourdais followed him to take over third.

Ferrucci’s wasted very little time behind the Canadian and eventually took the lead in Turn 3 on Lap 84. The wind seemed to fall into his sails as he jetted away from the field and extended his lead to 7.77 seconds by Lap 100.

Hinchcliffe began the stops for the leaders on Lap 110 while Ferrucci stretched his fuel five extra laps before making his stop and trading the lead off to Bourdais.

Bourdais made his stop a lap later and leapfrogged Hinchcliffe to lockout an effective DCR 1-2 once the cycle was to complete when Marcus Ericsson crashed on Lap 120.

The pits closed and put Marco Andretti at the front of the field while he waited for the pits to open. Andretti stopped under the yellow which put the DCR duo back to the front ahead of Hinchcliffe and the championship pair of Rossi and Newgarden.

The championship pair traded spots on the Lap 130 restart only to have their battle slowed again when Spencer Pigot crashed on Lap 133.

Rossi dispatched Hinchcliffe on the next restart to take over the third spot while the DCR pair cleared the pack after a brief battle with the lapped car of Zach Veach.

Ferrucci and Bourdais emerged as the class of the field throughout the stint with the rookie only holding a scant lead over his four-time champion teammate.

The pair eventually kicked off the final round of pitstops on Lap 188 when they stopped together. Everything nearly came apart for Ferrucci as the crew had issues with changing the right rear tyre which allowed Bourdais to jump ahead.

The pair's stops moved Sato to the lead for the first time in the race with veterans Tony Kanaan and Ed Carpenter trailing him for second and third. The trio had the rare benefit of having a lap up on the field as the field cycled through their final round of stops.

That proved to be to their advantage on Lap 192 as Bourdais suddenly smacked the wall in Turn 4 and brought out the yellow – securing the leaders on their own lap.

That allowed them to remain in the lead after making their requisite stop while Newgarden reared them up in fourth ahead of Ferrucci.

Clean air allowed Sato to blast away from Kanaan while Rossi started giving up spots while conserving fuel to go the distance.

The Japanese driver only managed to get as big as 1.5 seconds away from the Brazillian while Carpenter held onto third ahead of fellow Americans Ferrucci and Newgarden.

Newgarden found his way round Ferrucci and eventually breathed a simple sigh of relief as championship rival Rossi ducked onto pit road with 20 to go to top up on fuel.

Ferrucci kept the points leader in his sights and retook the spot on Lap 235 but surrendered it back 10 laps later after hitting the marbles

The coveted battle for the top three was just as hot as Carpenter took the second spot from Kanaan with four to go.

He quickly erased Sato’s small put comfortable lead and made a last gasp effort at the line but came up .0399 seconds short at the line.

Kanaan scored his first podium since Texas in 2017 while Ferrucci came out in fourth after getting offline on the final lap and pitching Newgarden into the grass in the final corner.

That elevated Newgarden’s Penske teammate Simon Pagenaud to fifth and Conor Daly to sixth as Newgarden crawled across the line in seventh.

Ryan Hunter-Reay lead a Honda train completing the top ten followed by Colton Herta in ninth and Marco Andretti in tenth.