Grand Prix of Baltimore Race Report

Suffering a problem with the anti-stall mechanism on Lap 1, Ryan Hunter-Reay found his way at the back of the field before charging his way back up to eighth place. Just after hitting the halfway mark of the Grand Prix of Baltimore, the No. 1 car’s battery failed and was unable to be put into neutral to return to pit lane for a restart. The reigning IZOD IndyCar Series champion retired early with a 20th-place finish and is (unofficially) seen as fifth in the title fight.

“Yeah I believe in miracles, but that’s probably what it’s going to take now (to clinch the championship). Hard work and fight hard probably isn’t going to do it from here. I’m just so disappointed; we had an anti-stall mechanism kick in and it worked as it wasn’t supposed to, and I was supposed to be able to pull the clutch and get going with it. Unfortunately, I had to get it back to neutral, went back to the back of the pack, we were passing some cars, had a great car, and then out of nowhere the car just died – electronics cut out on it, battery voltage looked good and then all of a sudden it just fell through the bottom. It’s heartbreaking especially when you see Helio Castroneves stuck in Turn 1 and the fact that we’re sitting in here on the other side of the track. Thanks to all the fans for their support and thank you to our great partners at DHL, Sun Drop, Chevrolet, Circle K for sticking behind us. We had a great season, and there is still more to go and we can still win out here.”