Ana Beatriz returns to the No. 24 Ipiranga car for Dreyer & Reinbold Racing for this weekend's Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach. She sat out the Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama because of a fractured right wrist (scaphoid bone) that required surgery suffered in the season opener March 27.
Beatriz was re-evaluated April 11 by the IndyCar medical team and cleared to drive. She has been fitted with a carbon fiber brace that she will wear in the car.
"I was disappointed that I couldn't be in the car at Barber, but I learned a lot from another angle being there with the team," said Beatriz, whose seat was filled by Simon Pagenaud, who finished eighth. "I know the Long Beach track as I raced there in Indy Lights so I feel prepared going into the weekend. My wrist will be sore, but the doctors said that I will be OK. I may not be 100 percent, but I will push through it and I'm ready to get back in the Ipiranga car."
Teammate Justin Wilson, who suffered a fractured left wrist in the same race, wore a similar brace at Barber Motorsports Park last weekend.
"My wrist is feeling fine, it just has a little bit of throbbing, not too bad," said Wilson, the runner-up in last year's race at Long Beach. "I'm hoping once I get a rhythm through the hairpin that I will be fine."