Grosjean impresses to clinch maiden IndyCar podium

Romain Grosjean earned a maiden podium in IndyCar with second at the Indy Grand Prix as Dutchman Rinus Veekay took his first win.

The former Haas driver had started on pole for the first time in just his third race in the series, six months after his horrific crash at the Bahrain Grand Prix.

Having led 44 laps out of 85 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Grosjean showed immense speed to take his first podium since his Lotus F1 days at the 2015 Belgian Grand Prix.

Grosjean made the perfect jump leading his first rolling start to the green flag, holding position as Conor Daly and Graham Rahal collided mid-pack.

With Daly's car parked in the grass run-off at turn one, Grosjean would be forced to lead a more familiar single-file restart after a period behind the pace car.

The Frenchman showed supreme pace early on to stretch out a five-second advantage over Jack Harvey before the British driver suffered a puncture to drop out of contention.

After the first round of pit stops Grosjean's speed continued before his second stop on lap 43, but his mandatory stint on the slower black sidewall tyres allowed Veekay to close in and overtake with the Dutchman having used his black tyres early in the race.

With the threat of rain looming over the closing stages, Veekay stretched out an eight-second margin as Grosjean got held up by countryman Sebastian Bourdais, who was a lap down.

Grosjean cut the gap to five seconds but had to settle for second, with Spaniard Alex Palou completing the podium.

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