ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — For much of Sunday’s Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, it appeared that a former Formula One driver would win the NTT IndyCar Series season opener.
It came true, but it wasn’t who many expected.
Instead of Romain Grosjean of Andretti Autosport winning the race for the pole, it was 106th Indianapolis 500 winner Marcus Ericsson of Chip Ganassi Racing that scored the victory in a wild and chaotic race.
It was filled with chaos and calamity, including two cars that went airborne in two separate crashes and one driver, Jack Harvey, being sent to a local hospital “out of an abundance of care and caution” according to the IndyCar medical team.
He was checked and released from Bayfront Medical Center in St. Petersburg.
But last year’s Indy 500 winner from Sweden was calm and cool when it mattered the most, stalking race leader Pato O’Ward until the Arrow McLaren driver’s Chevrolet stalled at the end.
That allowed Ericsson to pounce in the No. 8 Huski Chocolate Chevrolet. He took the lead with four laps to go and went on to finish 2.4113-seconds ahead of O’Ward’s Chevrolet to claim his fourth career NTT IndyCar Series victory.
Chip Ganassi Racing teammate Scott Dixon was third, giving team owner Chip Ganassi two drivers in the top three.
“What a great way to start the season,” Ganassi said as he climbed down the timing stand to celebrate with the winning driver in victory lane.
O’Ward’s Arrow McLaren teammate Alexander Rossi finished fourth in his first race with the team after leaving Andretti Autosport at the end of last season. That gave Arrow McLaren two drivers in the top four.
The podium of Pato O’Ward (left), Marcus Ericsson (middle) and Scott Dixon (right). (Al Steinberg Photo)
Young Callum Ilott of Juncos-Hollinger Racing had his career-best finish of fifth in the No. 77 Chevrolet.
Graham Rahal of Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing finished sixth and last year’s IndyCar Series champion, Will Power, finished seventh in a Chevrolet.
“Everyone seems to forget about Rahal, but we had a great day today,” team owner Bobby Rahal quipped afterwards.
The race got off to a very bad start when Scott Dixon’s car made contact with his friend, Arrow McLaren’s Felix Rosenqvist, sending that driver into the wall. Further back, it triggered a multi-car pileup that included Devlin DeFrancesco’s Honda hitting the tire barrier and rebounding into the track sideways.
That is when rookie driver Benjamin Pedersen slammed into the side of DeFrancesco’s car at high speed. The impact of the T-bone launched DeFrancesco’s car into the air, spraying debris across the race course.
The race was red flagged for 19 minutes, 25 seconds to clear the race course of the damage.
Other drivers involved included both Meyer-Shank Racing cars including four-time Indianapolis 500 winner Helio Castroneves and 2019 Indy 500 winner Simon Pagenaud, as well as both A.J. Foyt Racing drivers including Santino Ferrucci and Pedersen.
Rookie driver Sting Ray Robb was also in the crash but was able to continue in the race.
“First, I just hope everybody is OK,” Dixon said from inside his car during the red flag. “Second, Felix is my best friend and I’m kind of sad we made contact there. You know that area kind of funnels and the outside wall comes in. I thought I was clear, and I felt just a small rub. I was in the mirror it kind of backed up the track there and figured it must have been a bigger hit for him.
“I feel really bad for Felix.”
Rosenqvist was dejected with his early exit from the race, but did not harbor any hard feelings toward Dixon, his former teammate and friend.
“It felt like he didn’t see I was there,” Rosenqvist said. “The wall comes back on the left. I never expected him to swerve out and take the normal racing line because we were side-by-side. I didn’t really try to go on the outside. I was just trying to get through the first couple of turns. He was on the reds, so he likely would have got me. I was just hanging there, and he didn’t know I was there.”
Castroneves suffered an injury to his right hand, which was being iced down, and an injury to his right leg which he described as hitting his funny bone.
‘I’m very good, incredible by the AMR IndyCar Safety team,” Castroneves said. “This new facility is fantastic. They took an x-ray and I’m OK, I told them it just feels I got hit in the funny bone.’”
Romain Grosjean (28) leads early on in the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg. (Al Steinberg Photo)
Once racing resumed, Grosjean led the first 32 laps before Scott McLaughlin took the lead when Grosjean pitted. McLaughlin would lead twice for a race-high 37 laps.
Kyle Kirkwood went airborne over Rinus VeeKay’s Chevrolet and Harvey’s Honda on lap 42. On the ensuing restart, Colton Herta got squeezed into the wall because of some hard racing with Power, ending his race on lap 50.
“Oh yeah, he wanted to use the next state over for track room on the exit there,” Herta said. “I’m not sure what I could do there.”
One of the most decisive moments of the race came on Lap 72 after a round of pit stops between the two main contenders for the victory.
Grosjean pitted on lap 71 for what he hoped would be the final stop of the race. One lap later, McLaughlin pitted as the leader.
As Grosjean came down the frontstraight at full speed, McLaughlin left pit lane on cold tires and the two cars intersected at pit out in a side-by-side battle.
But as the two cars raced into the turn four area, both made contact, and both crashed into the tire barrier. Grosjean’s race was over, but McLaughlin would later continue in the race and finish 13th, one lap down. He was issued an “avoidable contact” penalty by IndyCar Race Control.
“First of all, I’m very sorry to Romain, he’s a friend of mine and I made a mistake,” McLaughlin said. “I don’t race like that, I apologize. I was racing for the win. I just made a stuff up. I really do apologize to Romain, and I’ll go see him in a bit. I knew if I could stay in front of him, I had a shot to win. I need to be better than that, I need to make better decisions. I was racing hard; I was racing for the win.
“I need to man up and I’m going to see Romain right now.”
The ultimate outcome of the race came with O’Ward in the lead before he had an issued with the Plenum coming out of Turn 13. His car slowed briefly, and that was all Ericsson needed to capitalize and take the lead.
“We did everything right today,” O’Ward said. “Ugh. It’s always something. The boys deserved that. Yeah. Dallas is next. We’ll fight for that one and compared to where we were last year, it’s a massive step. We gave that one away. We can’t have that happen anymore. I know we’re second but … yeah.
“There was a plenum fire in the engine, and it shut off.
Ericsson, the former Formula One driver who has become an IndyCar star with Chip Ganassi Racing, drove to the fourth IndyCar victory of his career.
“Obviously, that’s racing,” Ericsson said. “I feel bad for Pato for having an issue. That’s racing. You need to get to the finish line. We were having such a good weekend. The car was fantastic all the way through, and we were hunting him down, putting the pressure on and then things happened. Really proud of the team.
“That was a hell of a start to the season. I think people forget us in some conservations when they talk about the championship. We’re here to win. We won the 500 last year. We were leading the championship for a long time. That’s our mission this year this is a good start to it.
Taylor’s been a great addition to the team. He’s brought a lot of experience and energy to the team. Win on your first try, it doesn’t get much better than that.
“Such a great start to the season.”
Keyword: Ericsson Takes Advantage Of O’Ward’s Misfortune, Wins In St. Pete