Dale Coyne Racing's Santino Ferrucci labelled the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach a "learning experience", after a tough debut outing on the South Californian street circuit.
After being jumped by team-mate Sebastien Bourdais at the initial start of the race, Formula 2 convert Ferrucci felt it best to watch the vastly more experienced Frenchman make his way through the field and follow suit.
Ferrucci's race fell apart after his first pit-stop on lap 26 whereupon leaving the pit lane his #19 David Yurman car bottomed out, causing the 20-year-old to go deep into the run-off area; race control opted against throwing a caution.
Ferrucci stalled his Honda engine as he attempted to re-join the action, which meant he plummeted down the field.
He was able to keep posting competitive lap times once he had got restarted but eventually finished the race two laps down in 21st place.
"We had a clean start, Sebastien seemed pretty quick so when he got close to me, I didn’t fight him," explained Ferrucci.
"I’m happy I didn’t because he passed a couple of cars and I watched and followed suit, so it was a good learning experience for me.
"We seemed pretty quick as well and wanted to run his strategy. But when I came out of the pits, with a heavy fuel load I just bottomed too hard coming into 1, locked the fronts and went into the runoff.
"Unfortunately, I couldn’t get the car spun with the heavy fuel load, I spun halfway and that caught me off guard and I stalled it. There was nothing we could do from that point on but to turn it into a learning race."
