Van Kalmthout is hard on himself: "This pit stop was just stupid"
Persbericht Rinus van Kalmthout
General
- GPblog.com
Rinus van Kalmthout had a strong start of his first Indy 500. The Dutch rookie was allowed to start from the second row and drove long in the lead group. During his second pit stop, however, things went badly wrong, so he drove near the rear for the rest of the race.
The error at the pit stop
"That pit stop was just stupid", Van Kalmthout wrote down in a press release on Monday morning. VeeKay came in for his second pit stop of the day, but when he slowed down to stop his car, the Dutchman shot through and hit the pit wall and his mechanics.
"Once I blocked I knew I had no chance. I hit a mechanic, and I hate that. Luckily, he's doing well under the circumstances. I want to apologise to all my fans, I've had so much support over the last few weeks - you deserved more. I had the car in front of me, but unfortunately one mistake threw a spanner in the works", continues VeeKay.
Speed was there
Despite the mistake in the pit stop and racing in the rear, the Dutchman showed a lot of speed. Including a beautiful overtake outside after a neutralization. "We had a top car these two weeks. Ed Carpenter Racing has taken great care of me. At times in the race I felt like a fish in water - after the first pit stop, where I had a little wing to it and adjusted the weightjacker, I flew forward. That felt perfect", says van Kalmthout.
"I learned a lot. A lot of new impressions, a lot of new information. Everything has to be perfect on the Indy and unfortunately I made one mistake of my own, so we lost the chance to get the bottle of milk", concludes VeeKay.