Will Power said he was helpless to avoid a pit lane collision with Ana Beatriz which ruined his race and cost him the championship lead, but resolved to come back fighting at the Las Vegas finale.
Power had led from the race's opening until lap 48, when he dove into the pits for the first time, only for the Dreyer and Reinbold team to release Beatriz into his path. The damage not only required lengthy repairs, dropping Power down the order, but cost him performance when he was finally able to rejoin.
Power said he had the car underneath him to win, but was philosophical even surrendering his points lead to Dario Franchitti with just one round to go.
"They just sent her [Ana Beatriz] into me – there's nothing I could do about that one," Power explained. "We had the quickest car, an unbelievably fast car, but after that happened it tore a hole in the side pod, we lost 4mph and that was that.
"It was just a fight to hang on to the back of the field, the car was still handling well but it had no speed – there was so much drag it was just impossible.
"I wasn't surprised [Dario Franchitti] ended up leading but I don't think he was as quick as we were, our car was really fast and you saw in that first stint we were able to pull away. I was expecting those guys to end up at the front no question, but I wasn't expecting us to have a day like we had – lose so many points and so much potential.
"That's racing – we will just come back at Vegas. It is what it is, we can't do anything about it now."