The Sunday race at Iowa Speedway saw very unexpected twists, including Pato O’Ward inheriting the lead from Josef Newgarden to win the race.

It was looking like a dominant sweep of the weekend for Newgarden, who won the first race, until something broke on the car, later revealed to be a damper failure, which is a rare cause, on lap 236 of 300.

“It definitely was a bit of a shock,” Newgarden said. “I want to cry. I’m so sad for my team. I don’t know what happened. It was a good run. It’s just one race but I feel terrible for us. Team Chevy and Hitachi guys did a great job. Something went wrong there.”

O’Ward had almost a perfect weekend, finishing second in race one and winning race two.

“Great weekend for us,” O’Ward said. “We knew we needed to execute this weekend to have a shot at the championship. The guys were great in the pits. I did my job in the car, and I knew we had to pace to win one.

“The problem was just trying to get up to Josef — and one thing is getting up to him, and one thing is passing him. I’m glad he’s okay. We took advantage of the opportunity that presented itself and just walked away with it. I knew we had the pace to do it. It’s just about being in the right situation.”

Newgarden led 148 laps and was primed to take the championship lead by 10 points until the crash; his misfortune dropped the Iowa specialist from second to fourth in the standings. O’Ward’s win was helpful to his championship aspirations as he improved from sixth to fifth, just 36 points behind leader Marcus Ericsson.

Jimmie Johnson got a career best finish of fifth, basically being the star of the show until Newgarden crashed, he passed Marcus Ericsson to claim it.

NEXT UP: Gallagher Grand Prix at IMS Road Course, Saturday.