Esteban Gutierrez to replace Sebastien Bourdais at Dual in Detroit

Former F1 driver Esteban Gutierrez will race in place of the injured Sebastien Bourdais at this weekend’s Chevrolet Dual in Detroit.

Dale Coyne Racing announced Thursday that the Mexican racing driver will compete in both races this weekend at the Belle Isle Park in Detroit as Bourdais continues to recover from his crash during qualifying for the Indianapolis 500. Bourdais suffered pelvis and hip fractures from the crash.

“I’m very grateful to join Dale Coyne Racing, a highly competitive team,” Gutierrez said. “When Dale Coyne called me, I had no doubt that this would be a great opportunity for me to get experience in the Verizon IndyCar Series. My target is to learn as quickly as possible. INDYCAR is a very challenging series for drivers, but I feel ready to take this chance.

“I’m excited about my debut races at the Detroit Grand Prix and I cannot wait to start working with the team, engineers and Honda, as well as driving a Dallara car again. I have very good memories of my successful GP3 and GP2 series seasons with the Dallara cars and I worked very well with them at Haas F1 team. I will do my best for Dale Coyne Racing, Honda and all the Mexican fans.”

“We’re going to miss having Sebastien in the No. 18 car, but we’re very happy with our choice of a replacement for him this weekend,” said team owner Dale Coyne. “Esteban has a great open-wheel racing background, especially with his time in Formula One and the GP2 series. I think he’ll do well in an Indy car despite the learning curve and we all look forward to seeing what he’ll do this weekend in Detroit.”

James Davison replaced Bourdais at the 2017 Indianapolis 500. He ended up 20th on the scoreboard after he was involved in a late-race pile-up.