The 22-year-old Danish racer started well, taking the lead from Alex Palou at the beginning of the 85-lap race. But things changed after the second pit stops.
During his pit stop on lap 40, Lundgaard switched to harder tires. Palou, on the other hand, went for softer tires. Palou ended up in the lead after the pit stops.
Despite his efforts, Lundgaard couldn’t get back to the top spot. He was passed by Will Power during the next pit stop on lap 62. In the end, Lundgaard finished in third place.
Lundgaard said, “Happy to be disappointed. Yeah, I think that’s becoming an expression in the RLL engineering truck. Sometimes we’re just happy to be disappointed.”
“I’m proud of the team. We qualified well at Barber, and I think considering how we handled Long Beach in terms of strategy trying to get too much out of what I think we could have hurt us on the pure result. Going into Barber, it was a pure strategy of just get through the race and make sure that we get a good result, and coming here, there was a minimum, which was a podium.”
“We got it, but I wanted it to be a win.”
During the second pit stop, Lundgaard chose primary tires because they were competitive in qualifying. He admitted it wasn’t an easy decision as the other option was used alternate tires.
“I think Alex was just fast today. He was fast here last year in May, in August. He’s fast wherever we go, really,” Lundgaard concluded.
