The race took place at 12:00 PM ET on July 4, 2021.
Race report
After airing concerns about his engine's performance, Josef Newgarden's engine was replaced before race day. [16] Newgarden got a well-sized jump as the race went under the green flag, with cars bunching up behind him. On the exit of the first turn of the race, James Hinchcliffe clipped the right-side rear of his teammate Ryan Hunter-Reay, sending himself into a spin and Hunter-Reay into the tyre barrier, bringing out the yellow flag. Felix Rosenqvist, who was behind Hinchcliffe, slowed down to avoid his car, but was rear-ended and spun around. All three drivers pitted after the incident, with Rosenqvist and Hunter-Reay's pit crews attempting to repair damage; Hinchcliffe took a new set of tyres and returned to the track. Rosenqvist returned to the track one lap down, and Hunter-Reay 2 laps down. [17]
Racing resumed on lap 3, but would be put under yellow again a lap later when Scott Dixon pressured Will Power on the inside of turn 5, hitting Power's right front and sending him into a spin. Power spun his rear wheels and kicked up a smoke cloud on the blind downhill after turn 5, and his car stopped on track after the engine stalled. Due to visibility issues with all of the smoke Ed Jones crashed into Power's car, taking them both out of the race. Power had his hand bandaged after the incident. [17]
Racing again resumed on lap 9, where Romain Grosjean passed Scott McLaughlin for 10th place, then trying to get around Sébastien Bourdais on lap 10, who blocked the inside of turn 2, with Grosjean nearly going completely off track, sliding his car around the turn. [18] On lap 32, Colton Herta took his regular green flag pit stop, but an issue refueling his car caused the pit stop to be much longer than usual. [16] Herta came out of his pit box after a 25-second stop (average stop is 6-10 seconds), coming out of the pits in 8th, dropping 6 positions down the order, and an additional position dropped after Graham Rahal passed him on the back straight. [19] Herta made his second stop on lap 57, this time stalling his car before coming out of the pit box. [16]
After the final cycle of pit stops for all drivers, Newgarden was leading by 6.5 seconds to Marcus Ericsson, with Álex Palou and the rest of the pack trailing Ericsson by 13 seconds. [20] With 9 laps to go, Ericsson had halved the gap between himself and Newgarden. [21] Ericsson continued to close in on Newgarden as the finish neared, Newgarden using up his remaining push-to-pass power to hold off Ericsson. At the start of the final lap, the gap between the two drivers was less than 1 second, but Newgarden successfully held off the advance, and crossed the finish line after leading 73 of 80 laps of the race. [22]
Herta had to stop again on the last lap due to not having enough fuel to finish the race. [16] Meanwhile, Patricio O'Ward came back from his poor qualifying performance, finishing the race in 8th, gaining 12 positions overall. Grosjean also recovered his qualifying drive, finishing ahead of O'Ward after starting 18th. Despite setting the fastest lap of the race on lap 65, Jack Harvey's three-stop strategy put him down in 19th place. [23]
