The NTT IndyCar Series was supposed to race on March 13 on the streets of St. Pete. That was their season opener. Unfortunately, that was also the week for when all hell broke loose for this COVID-19 pandemic. IndyCar, wisely decided against racing that weekend and like all other sporting leagues around the world, put their season on halt.

Without a concrete plan for the foreseeable future, a couple of the drivers decided to go back home overseas. I mean, how can you blame them?

Rinus VeeKay is just 19 years old. His family lives in the Netherlands. Why stay here in the United States when a world pandemic was forming? Same for Alex Palou. He’s new to this country and only 23 years old. Why stay here when he can go back to Spain and be with familiar surroundings and better health care for himself.

“Yeah, so as soon as I knew that we had like two months off, I had nothing in the U.S., so I had nobody here with me,” Palou said on Thursday. “I didn’t even have a sofa or a bed, so I just decided to go back to Spain with the family. I knew I had good medical insurance there, so that was one of the most important things that led me to take that decision.

Unfortunately for both, they probably should have never went home. But, hindsight is always 20-20. For them, no one knew then what this world would come to now. No one knew that we’d basically stop spinning.

Once out of the country, it was going to be difficult to come back. Travel bans were in place from the US to most of the world. Spain was one of the hardest hit countries in terms of cases and deaths, so for Palou, he would have an even tougher time coming back whenever that day may be.

Well, in April, IndyCar made plans for the series to just start on June 6 at the Texas Motor Speedway. While it sounded great, it was also ambitious. Could that race really happen? As the weeks got closer, it became a reality — it would happen. Now, Palou, who had been quarantined into an apartment without much workout equipment, had to prepare to race and had to also find a way back into the States.

“I knew it was going to be challenging to get back here; I didn’t know it was going to be so hard,” Palou continued. “It’s been really hard. We’ve been working every day for the last couple of months since I just went back to Spain, but we made it. I have to say INDYCAR did an amazing job. I was not able to go by myself or by the help I had in Spain, so if it was not because of the INDYCAR team, I would not be here today.”

VeeKay agreed. He said his journey back was tough but is happy to be able to get inside of the borders and ready to race his No. 21 Chevrolet for Ed Carpenter Racing.

“Yeah, it was tough to get back to the U.S.,” the rookie driver said. “When I heard the race was going to be on June 6, I knew the borders were going to remain closed. Well, we worked together really hard with the team, my management, the NTT INDYCAR SERIES.”

In order for it to happen though, VeeKay had to seek refuge for a bit in Mexico. He knew coming into the United States via the Netherlands wasn’t going to happen.

“Yeah, we found some solution to go to Mexico, stay there for a little bit, yeah, stay there for my quarantine,” VeeKay continued. “We got the green light to go to the United States. I’m now in Texas so I’m very happy.”

VeeKay, said that it took a while to get the approval and explained why he went to Mexico.

“At one time it was going to get less and less time till the race. We tried to go for safe, go to Mexico, at least be there, be closer to the U.S. If we don’t get an approval, I can stay in Mexico, yeah, then travel to the U.S.

“That was just something safe, trying to be sure that I made it. Once I was there, I got the approval. Yeah, so I stepped on the airplane and got to Texas.”

Team owner Ed Carpenter said that they worked very closely with IndyCar, Senator Todd Young and other senators in the state. He said there was a high level of transparency of what we they trying to do and accomplish. There was a whole lot of people that helped make that happen, do it the right way he said.

“Luckily, as all this was transpiring, they exempted pro athletes, which motorsports initially wasn’t on,” said Carpenter. It was an effort between INDYCAR, IMSA, NASCAR all working together to make sure that racing drivers weren’t excluded from entering.

“Really thankful for everyone that played a part in getting Rinus, Alex and many other drivers back in the country.”

Carpenter, admitted that he had to have a Plan B in place, a very good one in fact, just in case VeeKay would have been able to get back into the country.

“We had a very good Plan B,” Carpenter said. “Plan A was always the focus and we worked hard to get Rinus back. We’re thankful that he’s here and he can finally get his season started.”

Now, both rookies are thrown to the wolves. The veteran drivers have all said that they don’t envy the situation that the four rookies, VeeKay and Palou included, are put in. There’s very limited on track time, none of the drivers have been in a car since February and barely any one has been on an oval with the new Aeroscreen. Plus, no one knows how the Aeroscreen is going to do with cooling as the temperatures are expected to soar well into the 90’s on Saturday. On top of that, what about the glare from the sun to the Aeroscreen at sun set? What about the tires? There’s so many unknowns, veteran drivers themselves are saying that they’re “nervous.” What about the rookies?

“I had the oval test after the COTA test beginning of this season,” VeeKay said. “Yeah, it was amazing actually with the INDYCAR. Everything feels so perfect. Yeah, just the speed, the g force, everything is very insane. It was a great test. We made good progress with the car also. I was very, very pleased with that.

“I think coming to this weekend with limited time in running and everything, I think it’s very, very helpful to have Ed (Carpenter) as my teammate. Yeah, I think I’ll be asking him a lot of questions in the weekend.”

Palou, said he’s just been working on a simulator and going to give it his best efforts.

“I’ve just been practicing a lot of simulator. It’s not the same, but for sure it helps. And then I’ve been working with the team and with all the oval drivers that I know that I could ask and I could talk with them, my spotter, Roger Yasukawa, that was a driver before and was spotting for Sato last year. So I’ve been talking with as many people as I could to get as much information as I could because I think it helps if they can tell me just what’s up once you go with old tires or once you enter the pit lane the car is going to turn left. Like I had never done a pit stop on an oval. So those kind of stuff that seems really easy and simple, I think those are the most difficult ones because that’s the things that they come with experience.

“But yeah, I feel I’m the most ready I can be with the situation that we have now. Good thing is that we also have 30 minutes extra for the rookies, which that’s a really good thing. Thanks to INDYCAR for that. So I can just take those 30 minutes to build myself, get comfortable with the car again, and then the only thing I will not be able to test until the race is to pass cars and to be behind cars. I’ve been comfortable running alone at Texas, but everybody tells me it’s a whole lot different story when you have 20 cars or one car in front.

“We’ll see. It’s going to be challenging, but for sure it’s going to be a good experience for us.”