VeeKay, Rosenqvist cleared to return
LEXINGTON, Ohio – Felix Rosenqvist and Rinus VeeKay returned to their cars at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course on Friday after both IndyCar drivers were sidelined by injuries.
Rosenqvist missed two races after a crash last month in Detroit. The Swede said Friday he went through IndyCar’s concussion protocol after not being cleared by the league to race June 20 at Road America.
“You only have one brain,” he said. “It doesn’t really mean I have a concussion. But something could be wrong and they cannot take the chance.”
Rosenqvist was hospitalized overnight following a June 12 crash at Detroit. He missed the doubleheader race the next day, which was won by Arrow McLaren SP teammate Pato O’Ward in Rosenqvist’s honor.
VeeKay, meanwhile, missed only one race following June 15 surgery on a broken collarbone resulting from a fall from his bicycle during a training ride. He spent a day in the Chevrolet simulator this week to test the range of motion in his left shoulder.
“Yeah, ready to race and ready to win,” the 20-year-old Dutchman said. “I feel confident. I was first a little bit worried about maybe my neck would be painful with the pressure, with the Gforces, but I’ve done some neck training and felt nothing, feel super strong.
“Definitely no worries, and as long as I don’t go overhead with my arms, it’s going to be fine. So if I cheer going past the checkered flag first, I’ve got to throw up my right hand instead of my left hand.”
VeeKay dropped from fifth to sixth in the standings after missing Road America and trails IndyCar championship leader Alex Palou by 106 points headed into Sunday’s race at Mid-Ohio. He said he wasn’t concerned about the championship with eight races remaining.
“I just want to get back in the top five in the championship and just do the best I can and show some great racing and of course try to win every weekend,” he said. “It’s definitely going to be tough to catch up, but that’s not really any of my worries. I’m just going to give it all and see where I end up.”
Rosenqvist dropped from 20th to 24th by missing two races and crashing 22 laps into the race at Detroit. Taylor Kiel, president of the team, said Rosenqvist was hitting his stride in his first season with AMSP when he was injured.
“We finally felt like we were turning the corner in Detroit. We need to turn the corner and this is a really good place to do it,” Kiel said. “I know the potential is there and Felix is feeling well.”
Mid-Ohio is a 2.258-mile, 13-turn course for the 15th consecutive year. Will Power and Colton Herta each won last year when the event was a doubleheader.
The track hosted 22 races for CART/ Champ Car until 2003, when Paul Tracy won the final event. Mid-Ohio held few major racing series again until IndyCar debuted in 2007. NASCAR added the course to its second-tier Xfinity Series schedule in 2013.
New entries
The IndyCar field has 26 entries, three more than a year ago. The field includes Ryan Norman in his IndyCar debut.
Norman won two races over three seasons in Indy Lights before the Ohio native switched to sports cars last year and a ride with Bryan Herta Autosport in
IMSA’s Michelin Pilot Challenge series. The 23-year-old teamed with Gabby Chaves to win the championship in 2020.
He will drive the No. 52 Dale Coyne Racing with RWR entry at what’s considered his home track on Sunday. Norman made six Indy Lights starts at MidOhio with Andretti Autosport and tested the Indy car last week alongside Coyne fulltime driver Romain Grosjean.
“This is where I’ve wanted to be my whole career,” Norman said. “I went to sports cars to continue my development and improve and compete on a consistent basis. I didn’t want to get my chance and not be ready and that would be end of it in IndyCar for me.”
Santino Ferrucci is also back with Rahal Letterman Lanigan for the fourth time this season.
Ferrucci finished sixth in the Indianapolis 500 and sixth in the first race at Detroit. But he crashed in qualifying before the doubleheader at Belle Isle and the RLL team worked frantically to rebuild his car in time to get him to the grid. He finished 10th.
The Detroit crash followed one at Indianapolis in the days leading into the 500, and teammate Graham Rahal said Ferrucci’s addition in a third car needs to be smoother moving forward for the overall strength of the program.
RLL fields full-time entries for Rahal and Takuma Sato, and Rahal said he vouched for Ferrucci to team owner Bobby Rahal after Mid-Ohio last year as a driver the team should pursue.
“I’m not trying to be hard on the guy but we’ve got two races and two accidents, and the team needs to move in a forward direction,” Rahal said. “It affects the rest of the team. Two of my guys almost didn’t make it to the (Detroit) race because they had heat exhaustion from fixing the car. That affects my program, same with Taku.
“For us to be consistent winners, it can’t happen. We’ve got to be going forward. We can’t go sideways or backwards.”