Marcus Ericsson wins inaugural Ontario Honda Dealers Indy in Markham

Two passes defined Marcus Ericsson’s victory at the inaugural Ontario Honda Dealers Indy at Markham.

First, Ericsson and teammate Will Power bumped each other as the former was making a move late in Sunday’s race. Then, with four laps to go around the street course in Markham, Ont., Ericsson passed Romain Grosjean to take the lead for good for the fifth win of his IndyCar career.

“I think today we won it on pure pace,” said Ericsson, whose last victory was the 2023 Grand Prix of St. Petersburg. “We were the best car out there, and we won it because we played the game and we pushed when we needed to and we delivered when we needed to.

Grosjean was second, his first top-five finish of the year. Power placed third and driver rankings leader Alex Palou finished fourth.

Ericsson, Power and Kyle Kirkwood — who is second in the driver rankings — are all teammates on Andretti Global.

When Kirkwood crashed out of the race in the 53rd lap, the Andretti Global team knew they had to target Palou so he couldn’t get more points and clinch his fifth IndyCar title.

“We just talked about, ‘Hey, Marcus has got a lot of pace, tire and fuel advantage, we need to take the fight to Palou,'” said team principal Ron Ruzewski. “Obviously, we’re always thinking about the big picture. We need to take points away from Alex to keep Kyle in the conversation at all.”

Things didn’t go as smoothly as planned, however, as Power briefly turned into Ericsson’s car when he was getting passed.

“It was miscommunication because the team came on and said, ‘Marcus is really quick, he’s coming.’ I said, ‘OK, tell him I’ll let him go on the back straight so I can stay close to Palou,'” said Power. “He didn’t get the message, or it wasn’t quick enough for him.

“I didn’t even look in my mirror. I just turned. Obviously at that point I was upset because we lost such a gap but we ended where we were going to end anyway, so it was fine.”

Palou earned 32 points on Sunday and Kirkwood earned nine in his abbreviated day. Palou leads Kirkwood by 133 points in the standings.

Ericsson’s next target was Grosjean, who has yet to win on IndyCar since making the jump from Formula One in 2021. Grosjean had been fending off Palou for much of the race but was low on fuel and had worn out his tires considerably.

“At the end of the race I knew we had to go 37-ish laps on the tires, on the fuel. That was going to be a challenge,” said Grosjean. “When I saw No. 28 car (Ericsson) pitting, I thought there was no way he would catch us. The No. 10 (Palou) was behind me, which is always a worry. Opened the gap. We should be safe.

Even with Grosjean having to budget his car’s resources, Ericsson said passing him wouldn’t be easy.