INDIANAPOLIS — After fracturing a finger on his left hand during Sunday's Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, Ed Carpenter Racing driver Ed Jones visited a hand specialist in Miami on the instructions of IndyCar medical doctor Geoffrey Billows.

Fortunately, neither Jones nor the team expects the injury — which was heavily bandaged after the race — to keep him out of action when the series returns in less than two weeks for the IndyCar Classic at Circuit of the Americas.

The 24-year-old sustained the injury when his co-entered ECR/Scuderia Corsa No. 20 Chevrolet slammed into the Turn 9 barricade early in Sunday’s race. The wreck was a disappointing end to a disappointing weekend for the ex-Chip Ganassi Racing driver, who is hoping the March 24 race at COTA in Austin will be an opportunity for him to bounce back after a rough start with his new team.

“It was a frustrating weekend,” he said Sunday. “We had the pace to be at the front in qualifying. Then today, the guys gave me a great race car. We had to take risks to get forward quickly. I made it from 16th to ninth, then I just tried to get a run on (James) Hinchcliffe and unfortunately, I clipped the inside wall in Turn 9 and that was it. I’m sorry for the team; they did great work and they deserved a better result.”

A third engine maker on the horizon?

IndyCar President Jay Frye has made no secret of his ambitions to bring a new engine manufacturer into the fold to join existing partners in Honda and Chevrolet, and there appears to be progress on that front.

IndyStar learned that while IndyCar continues to pursue all prospects, one potential partner has begun to rise above others as the likeliest possibility. The source would not identify the engine manufacturer.

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That would affirm Frye's optimism from during the offseason when he told IndyStar that he and his team and been working with some “very valid candidates.” It could also mean an announcement is right around the corner.

With the series set to debut 2.4-liter turbocharged V6 engines in 2021, and testing of those engines scheduled to begin in the summer of 2020, a commitment from a new manufacturer would need to happen soon.

“It’s important to have some sort of commitment in the first quarter of this year to be ready for 2021,” Frye said a month ago. “So we’re pushing on that. We’re working on that every day.”

Davey Hamilton Jr. update

Race car driver Davey Hamilton Jr, who was arrested last month in West Palm Beach, Fla., on charges of aggravated assault and false imprisonment, posted bail recently and has entered a plea of not guilty to both felony charges.

One of the 21-year-old's attorneys, Indianapolis criminal lawyer Jim Voyles, was in attendance for this past weekend’s IndyCar event.

"We believe that the facts ultimately may come out a little differently than they are being portrayed at this time," Voyles said in a statement to IndyStar in the days after Hamilton’s arrest. "We believe there is another side to this story."

Voyles declined to elaborate on that comment this weekend but confirmed he had met with Hamilton as well as Hamilton’s other legal counsel, Florida-based attorney Brian Bieber.

Hamilton is scheduled to appear in court on March 28 for his arraignment.

TV Outage

For about 10 laps and roughly 13 minutes during Sunday’s Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, NBCSN experienced technical difficulties and was unable to broadcast the race save for some fuzzy audio.

An IndyCar official explained afterwards that there was “a power supply failure to one of IMS Productions’ uplinks due to two amplifiers overheating.”

IMS Productions provides much of the equipment NBCSN uses to broadcast the race.

The official said no one at IndyCar can remember this type of outage occurring before, so it’s very likely a one-time incident.

The season-opening race received a 0.38 overnight rating. Last year’s race was broadcast on ABC -- network TV -- and earned a 1.0.

The last time the season-opener was broadcast by NBCSN (2013), it earned a 0.36.

Follow IndyStar Motor Sports Insider Jim Ayello on Twitter and Facebook: @jimayello.