From the start, polesitter Herta was unthreatened, while Dixon swept across from the outside to ensure Newgarden couldn’t sneak up from third to claim second. Newgarden checked his momentum and that allowed Alexander Rossi around his outside to try and claim third, but Newgarden had put the matter beyond dispute by the end of the lap. Scott McLaughlin, his teammate, passed David Malukas for fifth, but there was even worse luck for the other Dale Coyne Racing-Honda, that of Takuma Sato who was shoved into the wall at the Turn 1 kerfuffle, and limped his very broken car back to the pits. The debris left behind obliged Race Control to throw the full-course caution.
Following the Lap 4 restart Felix Rosenqvist demoted Malukas down to seventh, while Power had already taken advantage of his alternate tires to move into 12th, from 16th on the grid, but rather than burn up all his push to pass trying to stay ahead of Romain Grosjean who he’d passed on the opening lap, he let the Frenchman back past on Lap 11 and pitted next time by to grab primaries. Defending champion Alex Palou, who had started 22nd, had pitted a couple of laps earlier to take on primaries and such had been his pace, the undercut ensured Power emerged behind him. To avoid the risk of getting jumped should a yellow fall, the leaders rapidly started pulling in, Newgarden remaining ahead of Rossi but now split by rookie Malukas. Herta and McLaughlin stopped on Lap 19, a lap after Dixon and found himself being outbraked by the six-time champion into Turn 1, to effectively take the lead. Behind them, Newgarden and now Rossi were ahead of Malukas, while Rosenqvist had turned in fast enough laps at the end of his stint to emerge ahead of McLaughlin and hold off the Penske driver.
