TORONTO — Santino Ferrucci will miss the INDYCAR race today at Toronto, as a hard crash in the morning warm-up damaged the car beyond repair.
With only three hours between the end of the warm-up and the start of the race, the A.J. Foyt Racing team did not have time to adequately repair the car or get the spare car ready to race.
Ferrucci was icing his hand after the accident, but the team indicated it was not broken and Ferrucci said he would be OK.
The accident occurred in the last few minutes of the 25-minute morning warm-up. Ferrucci said it was purely driver error, as he had not disengaged the hybrid power boost and was on the primary (harder) tires, which meant more power going into Turn 8. The rear of the car swung around and he slapped the outside wall hard.
“Mistake,” Ferrucci said. “I’m struggling obviously with the car. It was wet [from rain earlier] in that corner and I had been lifting and just out of habit, I’d been pulling the hybrid and I forgot to turn the hybrid off. … I just lost the rear [of the car].
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“It was a little bit of the boost in the power, it was just enough [and] we were also on the prime tire instead of the [softer] alternate just to get a read. Just a driving error. I feel pretty bad about that.”
Ferrucci was 10th in the series standings but had struggled this weekend on the Toronto streets. He was slated to start 23rd. Ferrucci will be awarded three points (instead of five for last place) for qualifying for the race but not starting.
“The damage sustained to the car requires extensive repairs that cannot be completed to the standard of safety and performance necessary to race,” the team said in a statement.
“While this is a difficult decision for the team, the safety of our driver and our crew remains our top priority.”
Bob Pockrass covers NASCAR and INDYCAR for FOX Sports. He has spent decades covering motorsports, including over 30 Daytona 500s, with stints at ESPN, Sporting News, NASCAR Scene magazine and The (Daytona Beach) News-Journal. Follow him on Twitter @bobpockrass.
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