It was another beautiful day at Indianapolis Motor Speedway as the Andretti Autosport Indy Lights drivers took to the road course for a full day of qualifying and Race 1 for the Royal Purple Grand Prix of Indianapolis.
After starting at the front of the grid, both Patricio O’Ward and Colton Herta quickly found themselves in the middle of the pack after an incident in Turn 1 caused the duo to fall pack to P4 and P5, respectively. Both drivers battled, with Herta landing on the top step of the podium and O’Ward finishing just outside the top three.
The drivers will compete in Round 6 of Indy Lights competition Saturday. Race 2 qualifying starts at 8:30 a.m. ET and the green flag for Race 2 waves at 1:15 p.m. Fans can follow Indy Lights competition via racecontrol.indycar.com or on the Road To Indy app.
| No. 98 ANDRETTI-STEINBRENNER RACING / CURB MAZDA |
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“I’m just ecstatic after that race! It was the most fun I have ever had in an Indy Lights Mazda – and it was a ton of fun to fight through the field after falling back from P2. I think it was very fair racing throughout the entire race, so I’m happy with the result that we got and I can’t wait to see what we can do tomorrow.”
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| No. 27 Riverina CDMX Mexico City MAZDA |
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“I thought the first corner was going to be fine. I was watching my mirrors closely and I thought we were going to go through there fine but right before the car was about to rotate I just got snowplowed by Victor [Franzoni] behind me which made me go straight. I went all the way back to fifth and made my way up to fourth, but kind of just got stuck. Me and my engineer, Mark [Bryant], took a gamble on the setup and the track surface was way too hot for the conditions that this setup would need – so we know that for tomorrow. I had a lot of fun and I think it was a hard-fought fourth place, honestly. Sometimes the car is really, really hard to drive and you can’t catch anybody, you can’t follow and it’s just downhill after someone hits you.”
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| No. 48 JOURNEY MAZDA |
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“I’m a little disappointed in the race we had today. We had a decent start going into Turn 1 and I was caught out in the contact that was made up front which led me to not have a good position in Turn 2. I was able to make a couple passes but then my tires locked up going into Turn 1 on an attempted pass, and I had a huge flat spot for more than half the race. I showed close pace to Colton [Herta], who won the race, and I feel like if I didn’t make a mistake with the flat spot, we would have pushed our way more towards the front. Onwards and upwards to tomorrow’s qualifying and Race 2. We will see what we can give then.”
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| No. 28 K-LINE INSULATORS, USA MAZDA |
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“Definitely not the day we were looking for. We’re looking for a bit more pace in the race and need to clean things up for tomorrow. The K-Line guys have been working hard and we’re working to figure things out for Race 2. Today was day to look past and use for motivation moving forward.”
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