Alessandro de Tullio took his second win of the Indy NXT season in Portland, finally converting pole position into a decisive victory, as Enzo Fittipaldi retook the championship lead by one point with a seventh-place finish. Feeder Series reviews the action as the Indy NXT title battle approaches its denouement.

By Vincent van der Hoek

De Tullio was in complete control of the 35-lap race at Portland International Raceway, leading every lap. The Andretti duo of Lochie Hughes and Max Taylor finished in second and third despite making contact on the opening lap. Tymek Kucharczyk finished as the best of the title protagonists in fourth.

Practice and qualifying

On Friday it was Chip Ganassi Racing’s Niels Koolen who set the pace in practice one ahead of Sebastian Murray and Hughes. Juan Manuel Correa and Myles Rowe rounded out the top five. The title contenders struggled in the first practice session of the weekend, with Nikita Johnson finishing 13th, Fittipaldi 18th and Kucharczyk 12th. 

Practice two on Saturday showed huge improvement from the Polish driver, who topped the session ahead of De Tullio and Josh Pierson. Jacob Abel – making his return to the series in place of Jordan Missig for Abel Motorsports, his father’s team – found himself in fourth, and Hughes posted the fifth-fastest time.

In qualifying, however, a familiar face emerged at the top, albeit in surprising fashion. De Tullio topped group one ahead of Taylor, Abel, Koolen and Johnson. Despite having less rubber than the drivers who ran later, he went just 0.0032s faster than group two pacesetter Hughes, who led the way ahead of Kucharczyk, Rowe, Pierson and Cusick Morgan Motorsports’ Correa. Fittipaldi’s struggles from practice continued as he qualified sixth.

Race

De Tullio led the field to green and held off Hughes and Taylor into Turn 1. The latter ran into the side of his Andretti teammate, but without consequences for either driver. At the back of the field, Nashville race winner Matteo Nannini hit Jack Beeton, which resulted in a drive-through penalty for the Italian. 

As the field funnelled through Turn 2, Johnson was forced off the track while cars went four-wide across the track. When the dust settled, the Cape Motorsports Powered by ECR driver had fallen back to 17th.

The first and only caution of the race was brought out by Carson Etter, who spun coming onto the front straight on lap three. Following the restart on lap five, it was all smooth sailing for race leader De Tullio as he started to build up a gap to Hughes, who had started inching away from Taylor. Kucharczyk followed them in fourth place, the entire top four remaining unchanged for the rest of the race. 

Battles were still raging behind, however. On lap nine, Koolen and Rowe made contact whilst battling for seventh place, for which Koolen received a drive-through penalty. While these two drivers were entangled and after Max Garcia cut the chicane on lap 10, Fittipaldi and Johnson went through and found themselves in the top 10. Not much later, on lap 13, the title contenders were promoted to seventh and eighth, their eventual finishing spots, as Pierson pitted from sixth with front wing damage. 

As the race progressed, the field spread out into even gaps, with not a lot of action apart from the battle between Rowe and Beeton, who collided twice while fighting for 12th.

The first time was on lap 26, after which Rowe had to give up the position for cutting the chicane. The second time on the final lap was more dramatic. Beeton hit the Turn 2 kerb and bounced into Rowe, damaging his front wing but still finishing in 13th. For the Abel Motorsports driver, however, the damage was more extensive, and he dropped to 22nd. After the race concluded, a frustrated Beeton had an altercation with Nicolas Stati over an incident that occurred while the former was lapping the latter. 

At the front, De Tullio won his second race of the season for AJ Foyt Racing, converting his eighth pole position after most races that followed the first seven ended in misfortune.

“It feels good to get it done,” he said in the post-race press conference. “I think we deserve a lot more this year, to be honest. That’s the way racing goes sometimes. But I’m glad we never gave up. The whole team never gave up. We keep pushing. They keep giving me a great car to try again and again and again.”

Hughes tried to make a move on the opening lap but ultimately had to settle for second place. 

“[I] tried out-braking Ale on the outside. It didn’t really work, which I expected, just the inside being so strong here. Then I expected there to be some kind of carnage coming, so left the door a bit open, thankfully, because I got a pretty big hit in the side pod,” he said. “After that, [it] was a pretty boring race.”

Also speaking after the race, Taylor felt that he had “lost the race yesterday in qualifying” and “wasn’t able to capitalise on the start”, meaning he had no real chance to challenge for the lead.

Kucharczyk finished in fourth place as the best of the title contenders, with Abel in fifth the best Abel Motorsports driver on his comeback to the series. Correa finished the race in sixth, a fine result after a quiet drive on his 27th birthday.

Fittipaldi finished in seventh place, one spot ahead of title rival Johnson and thereby retaking the championship lead. Garcia had a solid day to finish ninth for Abel Motorsports, while Bart Harrison, making his Indy NXT debut in Portland for HMD Motorsports, finished 10th.

With three races left to go in the championship, Fittipaldi leads with 476 points, one point more than Johnson in second place. Kucharczyk is third in the standings, 18 points behind the leader. While they are still mathematically in the hunt, it is unlikely that Taylor, Hughes and De Tullio will play a major role for the title battle as they sit at 80, 90, and 98 points behind Fittipaldi respectively.

The three-way battle between Fittipaldi, Johnson, and Kucharczyk continues 29 and 30 August at the Milwaukee Mile before wrapping up a week later with a doubleheader at Laguna Seca.

Results	P1	P2	P3
Qualifying, Group 1	Alessandro de Tullio, 1:02.2006	Max Taylor, +0.0341s	Jacob Abel, +0.1110s
Qualifying, Group 2	Lochie Hughes, 1:02.2039	Tymek Kucharczyk, +0.0229s	Myles Rowe, +0.1369s
Race (35 laps)	Alessandro de Tullio, 38:44.4927	Lochie Hughes, +2.1885s	Max Taylor, +3.3041s

Standings	Drivers	Rookies
P1	Enzo Fittipaldi, 476	Enzo Fittipaldi, 476
P2	Nikita Johnson, 475	Nikita Johnson, 475
P3	Tymek Kucharczyk, 458	Tymek Kucharczyk, 458
P4	Max Taylor, 396	Alessandro de Tullio, 378
P5	Lochie Hughes, 386	Jack Beeton, 316
P6	Alessandro de Tullio, 378	Max Garcia, 286
P7	Myles Rowe, 344	Nicolas Stati, 182
P8	Jack Beeton, 316	Alexander Koreiba, 161
P9	Matteo Nannini, 307	Nicholas Monteiro, 150
P10	Juan Manuel Correa, 299	Carson Etter, 147

Read the previous round’s report here.

Header photo credit: Travis Hinkle / Penske Entertainment