St. Petersburg, FL (March 10, 2019) – Dale Coyne Racing’s Santino Ferrucci registered his best NTT IndyCar Series finish on Sunday at the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg by moving up 14 positions, the most of anyone in the field, to place ninth in the opening round of the season.
After a disappointing qualifying session on Saturday, which placed him 23rd on the grid, the rookie came back strong during the race to constantly move up the field thanks to a strategy call by the team, but also thanks to some excellent driving and fuel saving from the 20-year-old from Woodbury, CT.
About a third of the way into the 110-lap race, Ferrucci had made his way into 13th and by the time he headed to pit lane for his last scheduled stop on Lap 75, he had moved into 11th. After making his way into the top 10 on Lap 81, Ferrucci gained one more position with 19 laps remaining to take over ninth, where he stayed until the checkered flag fell.
“I can’t thank the #19 David Yurman, Cly-Del Manufacturing Dale Coyne Racing team enough,” expressed Ferrucci. “We found something in morning warm-up that was unexpected, and we made it work in the race. Our engineer, Michael Cannon called a brilliant strategy and I had to do a lot of fuel saving, to say the least. We kept it clean and in the top 10 and that was the goal. I’m really happy with today’s result, especially considering where we started.”
Ferrucci and the Dale Coyne Racing team will now head to Barber Motorsports Park for a rookie test day on Tuesday, March 12 before heading to Austin, Texas and the Circuit of the Americas the following week, March 22 – 24, for the second round of the season.
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