Rossi told to apologize to Hunter-Reay

Rossi was unaware he had done anything wrong

Michael Andretti's driver, Ryan Hunter-Reay spun out on lap 18 of the Honda Indy 200 when teammate Alexander Rossi tried to sweep around the outside of him entering the right-hander at the end of the backstraight at Mid-Ohio.

The two made slight contact and Rossi continued while Hunter-Reay spun but hit nothing.

Andretti, who does strategy for Hunter-Reay over the radio then had to put his driver in fuel saving mode after he was forced to stop too early as a result of the incident.

Rossi seemed unaware that he caused Hunter-Reay to spin when told him to apologize to Hunter-Reay

“I just told Alex to go over and apologize to RHR," Andretti told Autoweek. “He didn’t realize it was like that, but I told him it was so he needed to apologize. Alex would never intentionally do that. They will work it out and it will be fine.

“Ryan got spun and that screwed him. Then he had to save tons of fuel because he had to pit early. It could have been better but it’s the way traffic and things fell that messed some guys up. This is a track where it is very, very hard to get back with the leaders."

Rossi had a pretty good race and believes the incident happened because both drivers were on different tire compounds. Rossi was on the Firestone Reds — the fastest and softer alternate tire — and Hunter-Reay was on the harder, more durable Firestone Blacks.

“I just now saw the replay and I thought it was a 50/50 deal," Rossi told Autoweek. “You never want to have an issue with your teammate. I would never do anything intentionally to hurt any car, especially a team car. Ryan and I will talk and we will work it out, get on with it and be working together for Pocono."

"We had a good race going today and the DHL team was going to be top five no doubt, until we made contact with (Alexander) Rossi," Hunter-Reay said. “That set us back. We stayed at it and the boys did a great job in the pits all day. We were able to salvage a race that was going to be absolutely terrible and managed to keep it inside the top eight."