Conquest Racing team owner Eric Bachelart said Sunday night, hours after Tagliani was bumped from the 33-car lineup, that the Canadian driver will replace teammate Bruno Junqueira in the No. 36 car.
Junquiera, who didn’t get his ride until Saturday, qualified the second Conquest Racing car Sunday in the final round of time trials, while Tagliani, who qualified Saturday, was bumped from the field by Ryan Hunter-Reay, the final qualifier.
Tagliani, a longtime open-wheel racer making his first start at Indy, was relieved to be back in the race.
“I want to first of all say thank you to Bruno for being so understanding and to the team for taking this decision,” Tagliani said. “We have been building this long-term relationship for a while now and I’m more than thrilled to be able to pursue that by taking part in my first Indy 500.
The team also released a statement from Junqueira, thanking the team for its efforts on his behalf.
“It’s a shame that Alex got bumped out of the field at the end,” the Brazilian said. “I knew coming into this that Alex is Conquest’s primary driver and that if something happened to the first car that I would likely give him my place and I completely understand it.” The Associated Press
Qualifying has wrapped up for next weekend’s Indianapolis 500 with team orders deciding the fate of Brazilian Bruno Junqueira.
He qualified 30th in the 33-car field but will give up his seat for Conquest Racing team leader Alex Tagliani. Fox Sports
Bachelart acknowledged the team made a mistake by pulling his full-time driver out of line twice in the final 19 minutes of time trials, a move that allowed Ryan Hunter-Reay to surpass Tagliani’s four-lap average by 0.044 seconds.
“Now it’s obvious we were too conservative, we should have just gone for it,” Bachelart said.
Junquiera, who didn’t get his ride until Saturday, qualified the second Conquest Racing car Sunday in the final round of time trials, while Tagliani, who qualified Saturday, was bumped from the field by Hunter-Reay, the final qualifier.
“We’ve been working with Alex for a long time now and have built our commercial and marketing program around him,” Bachelart said in statement. “He has been our primary driver since the start of the season and we felt that it was in the best interest of the team and our partners to have him in the car for the Indy 500.”
Junqueira acknowledged earlier that it had been difficult watching Tagliani sitting helplessly in his car at the end of qualifying.
Initially, Tagliani was too stunned to say much.
He sat stupefied in the car as he watched the clock and the speeds, then quickly pulled down the visor to cover his face after Hunter-Reay crossed the yard of bricks for the final time.
“It’s kind of difficult to accept that fact that you need to go home with a car that is capable to be in the field,” he said. “It’s hard to comprehend.” USA Today
“I want to first of all say thank you to Bruno for being so understanding and to the team for taking this decision. We have been building this long-term relationship for a while now and I’m more than thrilled to be able to pursue that by taking part in my first Indy 500. Obviously it would have been much sweeter if we would have had both cars in the show because Bruno and I had fast and identical cars. It’s pretty much a fluke that I didn’t make the field. We just got caught out. You never want to second-guess yourself but if we had to redo things we probably would do it differently, but now that is in the past. At the end of the day, I’m just really happy right now to be realizing my dream of running in the Indy 500. The team has worked so hard all month and they deserve to be here,” Alex Tagliani said. Open Wheel World
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