Photo Credit: John Cote/IndyCar
At the start of the Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama the one and only incident of the day would happen, involving three cars.
It started when Carlos Munoz, driver of the No. 26 Andretti Autosport Honda, got into the No. 7 SMP Schmidt Peterson Motorsports Honda, driven by Mikhail Aleshin. He spun in front of Jack Hawksworth, driver of the No. 41 ABC Supply AJ Foyt Racing Honda, who had to get off track to miss hitting him.
Aleshin had started 13th, followed by Hawksworth 14th and Munoz 15th, but they’d all would end up at the back of the pack when the green flag was thrown for the restart. Unfortunately, none of them could recover from the early incident to have a solid performance for the day.
Munoz would finish the best at 14th position.
“We had to restart the race in the back (after the Lap 1 yellow),” said the Colombian. “On the first start everyone started to pack up and brake. I couldn’t avoid hitting Aleshin. They put us in the back of the grid, that didn’t help us at all. After that the rest of the race had no yellows, and with no yellows it’s hard to move to the front or do any strategy, so it is what it is.”
Aleshin would finish the race in 17th position.
“Well that’s what happens when someone doesn’t use their brain,” said the Russian. The rest of the race was bad because I got hit in the back of the car at the start and then someone hit me on my front wheel. The car was completely unbalanced after that. Something was bent, so the job was done before it even started.”
Hawksworth would finish 19th position for the day.
“We didn’t get a good start because Aleshin got him [by Carlos Munoz] and spun in front of us and I had to go off track to miss him,” he said. “They sent all of us to the back. On the reds, the car had a lot of understeer. We went to blacks on the third stint, and it was ok and we saved a lot of fuel, we had to go to used blacks on the last stint and it wasn’t very good. I got hit by Aleshin at the end (lost four positions) and that was it.”
Next up is the Angie’s List Grand Prix of Indianapolis on May 14th
