Rosenqvist ran wide and spun on the exit of Turn 6 during the early moments of the Q1 Group 2 session, just ahead of Arrow SPM’s James Hinchcliffe, which led IndyCar stewards to delete Rosenqvist's two fastest times.

Despite keeping his engine running and rejoining – rather than causing a red flag – the officials opted not to take the most lenient penalty, which would have been on deletion of just his fastest time.

Rosenqvist’s main argument was that the incident occurred during the black-tire laps, rather than the alternate red-tired laps that would set the fastest times.

“I don’t know what they were thinking,” he told NBCSN about the decision. “That lap didn’t mean anything for anyone. I had a spin, then they were saying that I blocked someone while I was spinning.

“It was the second lap on blacks which doesn’t mean anything. We were working for three days for this moment, we had the fastest time on-track and the guys have been doing an incredible job. I think it’s really unfair for them to just take that away, honestly one of the most stupid decisions I’ve ever seen.”

When asked if he would speak to the stewards about the decision, he replied: “It doesn’t matter. They ruined our day, maybe someone had something against me, they want [Colton] Herta to win the rookie championship or whatever. I mean, we just have to regroup for the race on a good strategy starting from the back.”

After the session, Rosenqvist also tweeted…