Arrow McLaren Team Principal Tony Kanaan says it was a good day for the team at The Thermal Club in California where Pato O’Ward and Christian Lundgaard who started on the front row came home second and third respectively.
Speaking following the race, Kanaan said:
It was a good day. Obviously, it was disappointing to not win, but a year ago, this was one of the tracks that we struggled the most at. So for us to come in here this year and dominate until the last pit sequence, I’ll take that any day. We’re all encouraged and happy with the result. This was a good job by the team and we executed the way we planned. If we aren’t going to win, then having two cars on the podium is the next best thing. We’re greedy and we’re going to keep pushing.
I want to thank the team here, in the shop in Indy and at Team Chevy. I think we’re setting the bar on the Chevrolet side and we’re fighting for the championship. These are good points for us, but right now we’re chasing one guy, and we’ll keep chasing him.”
Pato O’Ward in the No.5 Arrow McLaren Chevrolet dominated the race, however with ten laps to go he lost the lead and speaking following the action he said:
We took a gamble and it didn’t work out for us. We used our new Firestone Alternate tires in the start because we really didn’t know what the degradation profile was going to look like. The Firestone Primary tires turned into a bit of a negative toward the end of the race, and from that point we didn’t really have a fighting chance. We expect to fight for the championship each year, and weekends like this are where every point does count for so much more. But when you miss it by just that much, you definitely leave feeling like you left some points on the table where we would have looked at something different. I’m happy with the points today and we’re going to keep pushing. It’s a long, long, long season ahead, and the ovals are a different beast, as well.”
O’Ward heads to Long Beach in second in the championship, 39 points behind Alex Palou.
Speaking following the race he said:
We took a gamble and it didn’t work out for us. We used our new Firestone Alternate tires in the start because we really didn’t know what the degradation profile was going to look like. The Firestone Primary tires turned into a bit of a negative toward the end of the race, and from that point we didn’t really have a fighting chance. We expect to fight for the championship each year, and weekends like this are where every point does count for so much more. But when you miss it by just that much, you definitely leave feeling like you left some points on the table where we would have looked at something different. I’m happy with the points today and we’re going to keep pushing. It’s a long, long, long season ahead, and the ovals are a different beast, as well.”
Christian Lundgaard who started second came home in third place and is currently in fourth in the championship stated:
This was a good second weekend. I think we did a good job at the end of the day. We might have made a few mistakes from a strategy standpoint, but overall it’s been a very good weekend. Qualifying first and second and finishing second and third, I think we can take that. We’ll build on this and come back even stronger with a first and second next time.”
Nolan Siegel in the No.6 NTT DATA Arrow McLaren Chevrolet ended the race in 19th and speaking following the race he said:
“That was extremely frustrating. I think we had good race pace, but we ended up on the wrong strategy. We did one more stop than everyone else and couldn’t make up that time again. I’m frustrated and disappointed, and I don’t think that’s what this group deserves. I feel like I’ve said that every weekend now and we need to do something to stop feeling that way. Hopefully, we have a better one in Long Beach