The chances of a podium finish in IndyCar’s Grand Prix of Long beach looked quite low for Christian Lundgaard after he crashed out in the second round of qualifying.
His chances seemed to wane even further when it was discovered that there was damage to the car’s chassis, necessitating a switch to the team’s backup car for Sunday.
Lundgaard beat the odds, however, largely thanks to a bold strategy call that saw him start on the harder Firestone tires.
Most of the rest of the field chose to start on the less preferred alternate tires, with the thought being that an early safety car could allow them to quickly change off of them.
That was the winning strategy during similar conditions at the season-opening race from St. Petersburg. But the difference for the third race of the 2025 season is that there were no full course yellows at all.
The four drivers that chose to run the softer tires on their second stint ended up with the advantage because they were able to run in clean air for most of the opening half of the race.
Lundgaard started in 12th position and was able to advance all the way up to third by time the checkered flags flew.
“I told the team this morning, even before warm-up, ‘Let’s try to go aggressive, and let’s see what we can do,’” related Lundgaard after the race.
“We have the most tires of everybody. We had two sets of alts, three sets of new primaries. So I think all options were open for us today.
“We went off strategy compared to what we expected most of the field to do. We were the first primary tire runner in the field. I think that showed that we had the pace, too, today.
“I think we made up a lot of pace on those pit cycles. The clean air, took advantage of the clear air.
“Really happy to reward the guys. Yeah, they had to bring a new car back into play. ‘The Old Lady,’ as they called her. So for everybody to rebuild a car and put it out on track this morning, she ran effortless today. I’m extremely happy for everybody.”
Strategy was key
Lundgaard’s effort was no doubt helped by the fact that his Arrow McLaren team assembled the backup car with precisely the same setup as his primary car. But the tire strategy was the most rewarding decision of the afternoon.
Scott Dixon, Kyffin Simpson, and Santino Ferrucci all made up ground by employing the same strategy.
Ferrucci was particularly advantaged by the tire gamble, as he climbed from dead last on the grid all the way up to 11th.
For Lundgaard, he is only one of two drivers to have secured two podiums in the three races run this year.
Those strong results have lofted him into third in the points, and is setting him up to potentially have his best year in IndyCar since joining the series full time in 2022.
