Pato O’Ward talked after his podium result at Indy that he just wanted to find a way to get a win before the 2023 NTT INDYCAR SERIES season would come to an end. Last week, he came close. He was runner-up. Is Portland the place to end his 21-race drought?

He qualified 5th and finished 4th last year. O’Ward was also 4th, 2nd, 3rd, 8th and 3rd on natural road courses this year too.

On top of that, the young Mexican star has 8 consecutive top 10 finishes on the season including improving in each of the last 4 races (10th to 8th to 3rd to 2nd).

Is this the week?

“I’ve got some nice memories of Portland, mostly from five years ago when I won my Indy NXT championship,” O’Ward says. “At this level, it has been a bit of a rollercoaster for me in the past. We’ve had some good races and we’ve had some bad races, but I’ve always enjoyed going to that track. I think it’s one of the tracks with the most NTT INDYCAR SERIES history that we go to in the year. It’s quite enjoyable to drive around there, so I’m pretty pumped to go back.”

He’s reached victory lane four times in 70 career starts but none of which have come on a natural road course.

O’Ward is three points clear of Scott McLaughlin for fourth in points but 11 behind Josef Newgarden for third. Can he be the best Chevy driver?

He’s finished 4th, 3rd, 7th in points in his first three years and within striking distance of being P1 among the Chevy camp in 2023. That’s all you can ask for.

He’s closing that gap to the big teams. The last 20 champions have hailed from the Penske, Ganassi or Andretti camps. Ganassi will make this 21 straight.

The last time a team other than the “Big 3” won a championship was Panther in 2002 with Sam Hornish Jr. 

His only issue is not having a win thus far with his crux this season has been being overly aggressive at times.

O’Ward had 3 runner-up finishes in the first 5 races of the season. He was 4th in 1 of the other 2 races. The one that he wasn’t was being overzealous in Long Beach.

The Indy 500 he was aggressive on the Lap 192 restart with Marcus Ericsson in Turn 3. He was first, slipped to third by time we got to Turn 1 and when trying to get back, he overstepped it. In Detroit, a bad pit stop while leading and pushing too hard to make up for it saw him catch the wall.

Take those three races out, his average finish on the season is 4.58.