McLaughlin says Grosjean careless in Detroit

Scott McLaughlin has said that Romain Grosjean ‘didn’t really care’ when the pair came together at the weekend’s Detroit Grand Prix.

Ahead of the final round of stops in the 100-lap race, McLaughlin was in fifth with Grosjean right behind when the New Zealander made his final stop on Lap 67.

The Frenchman headed to the lane the following lap, but when the #28 Andretti Autosport Honda left the pits, he exited and turned into Turn 1. McLaughlin saw a gap inside of Grosjean and went for it but slammed the door on McLaughlin.

McLaughlin’s car briefly slid after his right front tyre hit Grosjean’s left rear tyre. The slide triggered the anti-stall system, causing the #3 Team Penske entry to briefly limp along instead of continuing under full power.

“Basically we got into Turn 1 there, the pit exit’s a little bit awkward but [Grosjean] just drove straight for the apex,” McLaughlin said.

“I was sort of committed, I was braking as deep as I could and he just went straight to the apex and I had nowhere to go. There’s a duty of care there from all of us to get out of there clearly and I just don’t think he really cared where I was, just turned across my nose.”

McLaughlin had one of the cars to beat on the streets of Detroit, however, strategy was not the three-time Supercars Champion’s friend as McLaughlin eventually finished seventh.

The #3 Team Penske Chevrolet remained in the top five during the first stint of the race but fell to sixth place after the first round of pit stops. After spending much of the second portion of the race in sixth place, McLaughlin then the contact with Romain Grosjean significantly altered McLaughlin’s fortunes.

Instead of resuming in 10th place, McLaughlin fell to 13th behind fellow Kiwi Marcus Armstrong, Colton Herta and Rinus VeeKay.

McLaughlin moved around VeeKay to 12th on Lap 72 and then to 11th on Lap 81 when Grosjean hit the Turn 4 wall.

Grosjean was seventh when he hit the wall. McLaughlin would have been eighth in the running order had his car not gone into anti-stall mode after his interaction with Grosjean. That would have opened up the possibility of McLaughlin getting a top five finish, but instead the race became one of loss management.

Following the caution for Grosjean’s contact and David Malukas’s contact at Turn 9 on Lap 85, the 2019 Bathurst 1000 winner moved around Herta to 10th on Lap 91. McLaughlin picked up ninth on Lap 96, eighth on Lap 98 and seventh on the penultimate lap from Armstrong.

“We worked really hard you know, just certain things didn’t go our way today,” McLaughlin said.

“We could have been easily deep in the [top] five there. But look, great recovery to come back through to seventh. I think we started like 12th with two restarts to go, so didn’t have many green flags to make hay, and we made plenty of hay. So yeah it’s all good, it’s just a little frustrating.”