INDIANAPOLIS — Just when you thought that the Zach Veach news on Wednesday that he will get out of his No. 26 Honda effective immediately was out of left field, Arrow McLaren SP’s announcement on Thursday afternoon one upped it.

First off, back to Veach, the news that he would be out for Andretti Autosport next season wasn’t all that surprising. Nothing against Veach, but this is a performance based business and his stats weren’t there over a three year sample size. The shocker was that he was getting out of the car now, not at seasons end.

Now to the elephant in the room — Arrow McLaren SP and Oliver Askew. They announced that Askew will skip next weekend’s Harvest Grand Prix (doubleheader) at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for what all accounts sound like “concussion like symptoms.”

First off, I applaud him for making the tough decision to get out of his race car. That’s a hard task to do. No race car driver ever wants someone else in their seat, especially for a young driver with everything to prove.

We don’t know the specifics of his contract details, but contracts don’t seem to hold much weight in racing anymore and there were plenty of rumors that a veteran could be taking a seat with the team. Would it be a third car or Askew’s?

No one knows for sure. If they tell you that they do, run away, they’re lying to you.

They certainly aren’t letting Pato O’Ward get away, so Askew had to be feeling the pressure. That’s why this leads me to the next point that no one got this diagnosis wrong.

I’ve seen some putting blame on the medical team for the NTT IndyCar Series and even the series themselves for misdiagnosing Askew following his Indy 500 crash. See, everyone is pinpointing these symptoms to his Indy 500 crash back on Aug. 23. He’s raced four times since then. Pundits are literally blaming IndyCar for allowing a concussed driver to race four times.

My question is, how would they know if he checked all boxes on that day in August? He was checked, cleared and released from the infield care center back on Aug. 23. I fully believe and trust the medical staff did everything they normally would do to diagnose a driver for any further injuries, concussion included, following a crash that he had.

In fact, the medical team gave us a demonstration during the Month of May a few years ago on the technology behind all of this. They have indicators determining on if further evaluations are needed on a driver that could have a head injury. With how hard of an impact Askew had with the inside wall off the exit of Turn 4 that day, I have to believe that all those indicators were shown and the series and their medical team did everything they could to determine if he had a concussion or not.

That day, he didn’t present anything showing he had a concussion. So, they didn’t misdiagnose him to that extent.

The thing is with head injuries, they can take time to develop too. Symptoms sometimes appear within minutes. Other times, it can take days to onset. That’s what I feel happened with Askew’s situation. It may have been a day or so that the symptoms set in and remember what I said about drivers not wanting anyone to get in their car, especially with what may be a contract year?

I’m not saying that’s what went though Askew’s mind, but it could have played a factor in it and who could blame him?

I also get why he’s now self reporting this too. Concussions can make you feel like you’re in a fog. If you felt a 31 day fog, you may think it’s time to seek more medical care.

That’s what likely truly happened. So, before we smear IndyCar and their medical team, lets just pump the brakes and do a little more research first.