Pippa Mann suffered a big blow in her quest to race in her fourth Indianapolis 500. While practicing late Wednesday — she ran 62 laps — Mann misjudged those in front of her and wiped out leaving the car in shambles.
What’s left of Pippa Mann’s car after her wreck in practice.
“I saw they had checked up but I didn’t think they had checked up that much and it just completely caught me out,” Mann said after being cleared at the infield medical center. “Got on the brakes but I was already getting into the gray trying to get onto the brakes. Completely my fault.”
After ramming the back of her IndyCar into the inside wall, she spun and hit the pit wall at the beginning of the straightway very hard.
“I knew it was coming,” she said. “The angle that the car was going at I’m like, ‘I’m gonna hit the end of the pit wall’ so I just got as far away from the wheel as I could.”
Mann, whose top speed was 224.056 on the day (22nd), wasn’t the only tough accident on Wednesday. Hours earlier, Helio Castroneves banged his ride up pretty good and got airborne.
Fortunately she is OK but severe damage to her 63 Honda car clouds her possible entry into the 99th running of the Indianapolis 500. She signed on with Dale Coyne Racing for the third straight year, this year with Susan G. Komen as the top sponsor. Not being a full-time driver and getting comfortable with the new aero kicks was a contributing factor, Mann believes.
“When you don’t get to get into a race car very often, sometimes you get things wrong,” Mann, whose best finish of 20th was in 2011, said candidly. “As I keep saying, my guys did not need this.”
Thanks for all the kind messages. I'll have a few bruises, but I'm good. I hate this for my crew guys more than anything…
— Pippa Mann (@PippaMann) May 13, 2015
Qualification for the Indy 500, which is on May 24th, is this weekend. Stay tuned for what’s next for Mann.
Watch what Mann had to say regarding her accident below: