ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Arrow McLaren Racing started the NTT IndyCar Series campaign with a pair of top-five finishes during Sunday’s Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg.
Christian Lundgaard came home third, with Pato O’Ward taking fifth at the checkered flag.
“Our strategy was good; the car was really good. I think we missed it in qualifying,” Lundgaard said. “Ultimately, I just have to say thanks to Chevy and Arrow McLaren. We put so much into the off-season moving into a new shop. Pato and I were really fast there. It’s nice to get it done at the beginning of the year, so here we go.”
O’Ward was pleased with fifth in the No. 5 Chevrolet.
“P5 was a good day for us. Obviously, we would have loved to have kept moving forward, but we were struggling a little bit there at the end with the race car,” O’Ward said.” We’ll dive into it and see what we need to make better for the next street course race. Now it’s time to shift to oval mode going into Phoenix, and see what we can get done.”
• It was also a solid opening race for Dale Coyne Racing, which landed both of its cars in the top 10.
Romain Grosjean finished eighth, while rookie Dennis Hauger finished 10th in his IndyCar Series debut.
“This weekend is a dream come true,” Hauger said. “I have dreaming of this for a long time, to get P3 in my first ever qualifying performance in an IndyCar was surreal and to turn that into a top 10 finish is such a great feeling. I think we did good this weekend, but I know we have more we can find in ourselves to finish even better going forward. We can build off of this performance and I’m excited to go out and do this all again next week. I had all of my partners from Norway here this weekend so I’m happy I could give them a good performance for them I’m so grateful for all their support.”
• Josef Newgarden was encouraged by his seventh-place finish for Team Penske.
“Just what you need on a day like today-just execute. Pit stops were incredible. The best I’ve seen in years,” Newgarden said. “The strategy was pretty standard, but it was a good day for our strategy. Just what we needed to do. Nothing went against us, and we tried to use our speed when we could to climb. You just have to be happy with a day like this. It’s a shame how tough the weekend was. I wish we could have had made more of it by starting up front.”
• Rinus VeeKay finished ninth in his debut with Juncos Hollinger Racing.
“Really good race to start the season,” VeeKay said. “Committed to a three stop, right away, and we nailed that. I think we really did all we could on that strategy. Yeah. A little bit of an unlucky yellow, at the middle of the race, kind of hit on the second pit window. I think it took some of our advantage away, our track position that we built on that three stop. I think we really maximized our race.”
• David Malukas had a frustrating debut with Team Penske, finishing 13th.
“We made a mistake early on that made or tire explode and sent us to the back of the grid,” Malukas said. “Had a really strong recovery and got it back to P13, so we scavenged some sort of points. Not the start that we wanted, but I learned quite a bit. There is a lot of learning curves there from a race perspective. I think with the whole new crew, everything new, it is a big learning curve for the rest of the season. Not the start we wanted, but upward from here.”
• Kyle Kirkwood was the best-finishing Andretti Global driver, taking fourth.
“It was a great day overall for the No. 27 crew and for Honda with Palou’s win and us in fourth. We were running in second for the majority of that last stint, but I ultimately just had too much tire degradation,” Kirkwood said. “It was beautiful race, and we had some beautiful pace. Everything went great—reliability, fuel saving, everything was up to par. We drove from 15th to fourth, which is a huge deal in the IndyCar series. Everybody knows how hard that is to accomplish, so it was a big day for us in the No. 27 car.”
