Linus battled back to a top five finish in Race 1 of the double-header weekend at Indianapolis Motor Speedway after clashing while battling for the lead in the early stages…
Starting from pole after setting the pace in qualifying, Linus kept his lead on the opening lap, but quickly found himself locked in a Scandinavian dispute with Andretti Autosport rival Christian Rasmussen at the head of the field.
The Dane managed to sweep past and take the advantage a few laps into racing, but Linus stayed firmly in the frame – launching a counter-attack into the Turn 1-2 sequence on lap five.
In a dramatic encounter, however, contact ensued, with both drivers spinning out of the lead and dropping to the back of the field with damaged cars, forcing them to pit for repairs.
As the incident had triggered a safety car intervention, both Linus and Rasmussen were able to catch up to the rest of the field before the restart, and once racing resumed they duly began their journey back up through the pack.
When the chequered flag fell, Linus had battled back from 14th and last all the way to fifth, salvaging some potentially crucial championship points as he continues to lead the standings.
Underpinning his pace, Linus recorded the fastest lap of the race.
LINUS: “I got a good start and managed to keep the lead on the first lap, but the push to pass effect is huge around here and as soon as that was deployed it was very difficult to keep Christian at bay. He got past me into Turn 7, but then it was the other way around and I had a good run on him into Turn 1.
“We went in there side by side; I was on the inside for Turn 2 and tried to give him as much room as possible, but eventually I ended up with nowhere to go when he turned in and unfortunately we clashed. I had some damage on the car after that, but we managed to keep going and P5 is good damage limitation. We’ll give it another go tomorrow.”
The last race of the weekend takes place on Saturday, with Linus once again set to start on pole.
Event Title Sponsor: www.racemore.com
HMD Motorsports // Jula // FX Airguns
