Linus Lundqvist earned the unceremonious label on Thursday of being the first driver to crash during running for this year’s Indianapolis 500.
The rookie was turning laps in the #8 Chip Ganassi Racing Honda behind a couple other cars, when he lost control in Turn 2 and went for a ride into the outside SAFER barrier.
Lundqvist’s car stayed pointing straight down the back stretch despite suffering heavy damage to the rear, and eventually came to a stop in the grass nearly halfway to Turn 3.
He was able to climb from the car with only minor assistance from the AMR safety crew, but, understandably, appeared to be a little shaken after his wild ride at over 220MPH.
“I’m alright,” Lundqvist said to NBC after he was released from the medical center. “Just want to apologize to the team. Obviously not what we were looking to do.
“It’s a shame. I know that the guys worked so hard to put this car together. It sucks. It’s my mistake. I know exactly what I did, I touched the curb in [Turn] 2 and couldn’t hold onto it.
“It’s something they talk about often around this place. It’s just a mistake on my part, and obviously the team has to pay the price for it. It sucks, but I’m alright.
“It goes so fast. Especially when you get down there and you realize where you’re at, it’s kind of too late. Like I said, it’s a small mistake, easy thing to happen. But obviously bigger consequences.
“The support from [Chip Ganassi] and the whole team has been great the whole way through. I know we’re going to bounce back from something like this. Doesn’t mean that it doesn’t suck in the moment.
“Obviously it hurts, especially when it’s your mistake. But we’ll rebound, I’ll learn from it, and there’s another week or so until the race, so we’ll bounce back.”
The incident came 90 minutes into the day’s running after he had completed just 23 laps, and the team has spent the rest of the day getting the car repaired.
It is unknown if Lundqvist will be able to turn more laps before the end of the day, or if he will have to wait until Friday to climb behind the wheel again.
The lost time is extra impactful because rain has interrupted so much of the scheduled track time to this point. Only 2.5 hours have been available to teams over the past two days due to an inconvenient weather system.
The rest of the field continues to turn a meaningful number of laps under sunny skies, and will have a distinct advantage over Lundqvist due to the additional track time.
