Colton Herta has insisted he didn't doubt he could end an IndyCar dry stretch stretching back to May 2022 before his controlled victory in Toronto reignited his title challenge.
Prior to converting his pole position on Sunday, the 24-year-old Andretti Global driver hadn’t won since his triumph at the Indianapolis road course in 2022, 41 races ago.
Herta produced a masterful display in Canada, topping every practice session and leading all but four of the 85 laps on his way to his eighth career win.
When asked by Autosport if the emotions were more relief than anything else, Herta said: “Yes, just finally getting it done.
“I don't think I had any self-doubt in myself, the team, or anybody that we're working with, that we couldn't win again or anything like that.
“But it is difficult to take weekend after weekend. It starts compounding into years.
“It's very difficult to be happy about a performance when it's not a win after that long of a time.”
The victory elevates Herta to fourth in the championship standings and adds to a respectable campaign that now features four podiums in 12 points-paying rounds.
With five rounds to go, four of which are on ovals, he sits 57 points off the championship lead, currently held by reigning and two-time IndyCar Series champion Alex Palou.
Herta believes the long-awaited win could spark a late push to make a run at Chip Ganassi Racing’s leading man.
“It's possible,” Herta said. “In testing, we were quite a bit better than Alex at Milwaukee.
“That's not to say that they're not going to find more speed when we go back. That's a big points weekend. That's basically double points with two races there.
“We've had success at Portland. We were on to basically win there last year until we got a speeding penalty.
“We've had really good cars at Gateway, qualified second there. There's a lot of tracks that we've had success at in the past coming up.
“I have never put my head down and said the championship is over at any point just because you never know in IndyCar.”
“No chance” of McLaren F1-style undercut by Andretti
Herta led home team-mate Kyle Kirkwood in an Andretti Global 1-2, in the team's first victory of the season.
But 2021 Indy Lights champion Kirkwood said there was no question of performing an undercut like the one that complicated McLaren’s Formula 1 strategy in Hungary.
Ironically, McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown had been spotted watching the Hungarian Grand Prix - won by Oscar Piastri ahead of Lando Norris after much team orders angst - on TV with Michael Andretti on the morning of the Toronto race, just before IndyCar warm-up started.
“There were no preconceived notions,” said Kirkwood of his strategy, which mirrored the timing of Herta’s two pitstops.
“Of course, we went into the race saying we need to dominate this race, and we need to run up front and we need to not put each other in positions where we might potentially get beat by other people.
“Ultimately the strategy we were both on was the best one to be on. It just so happens that we both pitted on the same lap. Fortunately, [out pit boxes] were not next to each other so we're not hurting each other in pit lane.
“There was no chance of an overcut and undercut potentially slowing somebody down just to get a position on one another, which obviously would hurt us.”
Kirkwood believed he was faster than Herta and that, if he had track position, he “would have sailed off into the sunset” in clear air.
“Ultimately it was team first,” he said. “Colton qualified on pole, he’s deserving of the win.
“I was also very fast. I think we were faster, but he was very, very fast himself. Yeah, he's deserving.
“I wasn't going to pressure him to an extent to where it might cause a hiccup for either one of us, not only for him.”
