LONG POND, Penn. – With dark clouds and lightning taking aim on Pocono Raceway, Alexander Rossi was in no mood for “moral victories.”

A victim of a Lap 1 crash that started when he was racing Ryan Hunter-Reay and contact was made between Rossi’s Honda and Takuma Sato’s car, it looked like Rossi was going to take a major hit in the NTT IndyCar Series points race.

Others involved in the crash included James Hinchcliffe and rookie Felix Rosenqvist, who went into the fence in Turn 2.

Because of damage to the fence, the race was red flagged. Once his No. 27 MilitaryToMotorsports.com Honda was returned to the garage, his Andretti Autosport crew immediately went to work to repair the damage to the race car. By rule, teams aren’t allowed to do that.

Other teams that repaired damage during the red flag included Hinchcliffe and Hunter-Reay. All three teams were assessed 10-lap penalties once their cars were on pit road ready to return to the race.

Because it was a 500-mile race with the possibility of attrition, it was worth the effort for all three drivers to get back into the race. As each car in front of them dropped out of the race, they could gain positions and points and that is what Rossi’s crew was hoping would happen.

The strategy looked like it would net Rossi a few more points before the race was stopped for lightning, followed by severe rain and ultimately the race was called after 128 laps of the 200-lap contest.

If the race had lasted one more lap, Rossi would have finished ahead of Spencer Pigot in 17th place. Instead, Rossi finished 18th after completing 39 laps. That’s where he was when the dust settled from the accident.

“Huge credit to the team for thrashing to get the thing back out there and pointed pretty much straight,” Rossi told NTT INDYCAR Mobile.

Rossi entered the weekend 16 points behind Josef Newgarden in the battle for the championship. Rossi remains second in points but is now 35 points behind Newgarden with just three races remaining.

“However, you want to look at it, I don’t know what to say,” Rossi said. “It’s not good.”

A few hours earlier, Rossi spoke about the Lap 1 crash that has deep impacted his chances at the championship in 2019.

“I can’t even begin to understand how after last year, how Takuma Sato thinks any sort of driving like that is acceptable,” Rossi said after he was cleared and released from the Pocono Raceway infield care center. “To turn across two cars at that speed in that corner at the start of a 500-mile race is disgraceful, upsetting and probably cost us a championship.

“It’s upsetting because this team works hard. We’ve got a couple of days to rebound and we’ll just go for wins from this point on.”

That begins next Saturday night in the Bommarito Automotive Group 500 at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway near Madison, Ill.