LONG BEACH, Calif. — A tire changer had his feet clipped by the car of Will Power but avoided serious injury Sunday during the Long Beach Grand Prix.
The incident left Caio Collet crew member Ryan Marzec with sore feet (X-rays showed no broken bones). But it left Power frustrated.
He wasn’t mad at the penalty but just the circumstance, as he was given a pass-through penalty for hitting a crew member on pit road.
He finished 19th.
Before talking to the media, Power did talk to members of Collet’s crew. Power had Christian Lundgaard on his outside as he was trying to leave his pit stall and tried to squeeze his car between Lundgaard and Marzec.
“It’s a very, very tight pit lane,” Power told me and another reporter after the race. “I feel bad that I hurt the guy. It’s very difficult to almost have three cars wide here, but I don’t think I could have gone any more left.
“I think I was almost touching [Lundgaard]. … You’re not going to see someone’s feet. [You’re being told someone’s] outside, outside so you’re looking out there and I must have just nicked his feet.”
Marzec completed the pit stop but was then taken for X-rays. He was released from the INDYCAR medical unit after the race.
Power, a two-time series champion, said the penalty was justified. “These guys got to be able to feel safe in pit lane,” he said. More than anything, he was frustrated that he had another bad result in his first year at Andretti Global.
“That is a very disappointing result on a number of fronts. You ran over a guy, but you’re also finishing another [race with] just terrible results,” Power said.
