A few days ago we quoted the opinion of James Hinchcliffe, a former IndyCar driver, who named five drivers who compete in the American series, but are quite worthy of Formula 1.
Third on the list was Linus Lundqvist, who is in his first full season in IndyCar, and the 25-year-old Swede finished on the podium yesterday at Barber Motorsports Park in Alabama.
For the Chip Ganassi Racing rookie, this was only his seventh race in IndyCar; he spent the first three at the end of last season, but for a different team. Yesterday Linus started 19th, but over 90 laps he gained 16 positions, reached the top three and finished third. Moreover, he lost less than two and a half seconds to the winner, the most experienced Team Penske racer Scott McLaughlin.
“I don’t really like the expression ‘For us this is the same as winning’, but I am very happy to be on the podium! – said a satisfied Lundqvist after the finish. The first few races of the season were not easy for me, and even this weekend we had some small problems. But what can I say? The team did a great job, the car was exceptionally fast and I just did what I was told.”
Other well-known Europeans who now compete in IndyCar performed worse: Felix Rosenqvist, Linus’ compatriot, finished 4th, current series champion Alex Palou (also from the “Hinchcliffe list”) finished 5th, Roman Grosjean – 12th, Marcus Ericsson (also a Swede by the way!) – 18th. It’s also worth noting that Luca Ghiotto drove, shall we say, normally in his debut IndyCar race: at the finish he was 21st out of 27 starters. Theo Pourcher, for whom this was the second experience of performing abroad, took 22nd place.
Source: F1 News

I am Christopher Clyde, an experienced journalist and content writer with a passion for sports. I have been writing about Formula 1 news for the past five years and am currently employed as an author at athletistic.com, one of the top sports websites in the US.