THE TEAM
Colton Herta led the field to green after claiming his second consecutive pole of the season.
Herta and the No. 26 Gainbridge Honda led 26 of the 80 laps before losing the lead due to a drive thru penalty for a pit lane speed violation. Herta was Andretti Autosport’s highest finisher of the day in 11th.
Kyle Kirkwood and Alex Palou made contact on Lap 19. Both cars continued the race, but Kirkwood was later issued a blocking penalty in Lap 79 of the race. Kirkwood ultimately finished 17th.
Romain Grosjean faced issues with the overall strategy and speed variation, but worked his way up two spots during the race finishing 12th and moved up one spot in the NTT INDYCAR SERIES Championship Standings.
Devlin DeFrancesco took the green flag at P24 and steadily worked his way up 10 positions through the field. DeFrancesco took the checkered flag with his best NTT INDYCAR SERIES finish at Mid-Ohio in 14th. He also moved up two spots in the NTT INDYCAR SERIES Championship Standings.
THE RACE
The 80-lap race saw four caution periods and a total of 158 on-track passes.
The track of Mid-Ohio showed seven lead changes throughout the race among five drivers.
START–1st
FINISH–11th
CHAMPIONSHIP–9 (204 pts)
“Disappointing day today. It just seemed to move backwards during the race and unfortunately we had a pit lane incident. I didn’t quite get the pit lane speed limit which gave us a drive thru penalty that threw us back. However, we ended up 11th. It is difficult to process the results of this race after starting P1. Hopefully, we can turn it around in Toronto.”
START–3rd
FINISH–17th
CHAMPIONSHIP–11 (177 pts)
“Not a fantastic day for us to be honest. We did everything clean, just not at a fantastic pace. Our warmup pace was good, but we needed to bring more of that to the race. The conditions earlier with the rain made the track slick and that had a lot to do with our deficit. We’ll regroup and give it our all at Toronto where we know we’ll be good.”
START–14th
FINISH–12th
CHAMPIONSHIP–12 (167 pts)
“We did our best. Strategy didn’t work in our favor, but we had a good race car. We just need to keep working and keep learning to come back strong in Toronto.”
START–24th
FINISH–14th
CHAMPIONSHIP–21 (104 pts)
“Overall, I think this was a damage limiting day for the No. 29 EVTEC Honda. To start 24th and gain 10 spots was also a great accomplishment for us. I think we were strong on the reds, but not amazing on blacks. This was a nice rebound for the No. 29 team after a very frustrating day yesterday.”
“Disappointing day. When you qualify two cars in the top three, you hope for more. Obviously, the penalty for Colton took away what would’ve probably been a top-three finish and Kyle’s spinning sent him back. Good points for Devlin, so I’m happy about that. We had challenges but got through to the end and all four cars finished. We look forward to Toronto now.”
TIL NEXT TIME, I AM STILL WORKING ON MY REDNECK!
