A race fan is set to receive a new car after her Chevrolet was damaged by a flying tire at the Indianapolis 500 on Sunday.
In the final laps of the race, Kyle Kirkwood’s car collided with Felix Rosenqvist after Turns 1 and 2.
It caused Kirkwood to flip and one of his tires to fly over the fence and fans in the corner of a grandstand before landing on the car in the parking lot, crushing the front left side.
On Wednesday, a spokesperson for Penske Entertainment, which owns the IMS track and the IndyCar Series, told the Indianapolis Star that the company would give Robin Matthews, a Indianapolis native, a new car.
“I didn’t see it come down,” Matthews told the Star. “I came down, and they said, ‘Robin, it’s your car!’ I thought, ‘No.’ I thought somebody was pranking me. It’s a car. It’s fine.”
Matthews damaged Chevrolet was subsequently towed from the parking lot and she was given the gift of kissing the Yard of Bricks, which is a tradition saved typically for the race’s winner.
The car of Robin Matthews was damaged by the tire that flew over the stands at the Indy 500.Screengrab via Twitter/@@AndrewKossackShe also received a ride home from IMS president J. Douglas Boles.
IndyCar owner Roger Penske spoke up on Monday in belief that an investigation will follow after the incident and that they were “very fortunate we didn’t have a bad accident.”
“I saw what happened, saw it bounced on top of a building and went and hit a car over there, which obviously is very concerning,” Penske said, while also noting that a wheel hadn’t “come off in a long time.”
The race was halted by a red flag after the collision, as Kirkwood sat upside down after turning over against the wall.
“All I know is I was up in the fence, which is never a good thing in IndyCar,” Kirkwood said Sunday. “Thank God these cars are so safe. I saw sparks flying everywhere. That’s the scary part. You’re upside-down and you’re kind of stuck at that point.”
Winner Josef Newgarden, who is the driver for Penske, explained that there are “tethers on the wheels,” which were added after deaths of race fans in the 1990s to prevent such an incident.
A tire at the Indy 500 flew off a car and over the fence.Twitter/@DavidBloomberg
A tire flew off a car toward the stands at the Indy 500 on Sunday.Twitter/@DavidBloomberg IndyCar acknowledged that one person was treated for injuries from debris from the crash, but no injuries from the flying tire were reported.
