The opening race of the IndyCar season is this weekend in Florida.
Formula 1 journalist Will Buxton (a familiar face to viewers of Netflix’s Drive to Survive) made the trip to cover the Firestone Grand Prix in St. Petersburg, Florida. The F1 season hasn’t started yet, and there are recent rumors of IndyCar legend (and current team owner) Michael Andretti preparing to field a Formula 1 team, which Buxton was clearly looking into.
Speaking to a lot of folks in the Indycar paddock this weekend. The Andretti F1 project is serious. Very serious. They could pay the entry fee as chump change. And in a non budget capped era have funding to make the top 3 wince. No wonder the establishment are worried.
— Will Buxton (@wbuxtonofficial) February 27, 2022
As part of his visit, Buxton posted a pretty standard Instagram story of a local landmark announcing his presence on site.
Because some of Buxton’s 178,000+ followers are apparently unaware of IndyCar, or that sometimes cities can share names, or that Russia doesn’t have palm trees, Buxton was apparently inundated with messages accusing him of making a statement of support for Russia.
That led Buxton to post the image again with a caption for clarification:
Obviously a lot of people are justifiably angry right now, and maybe Buxton could have foreseen what would happen by posting that initial image and cut it off with an initial caption. In the end, it’s just a notable misunderstanding.
The Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg starts at noon ET on Sunday, on NBC. Buxton’s main sport won’t resume until March 20th, when Formula 1 visits Bahrain. F1’s Russian Grand Prix has reportedly been canceled in the wake of their invasion of Ukraine.
[Instagram/WBuxtonOfficial]
About Jay Rigdon
Jay is a columnist at Awful Announcing. He is not a strong swimmer. He is probably talking to a dog in a silly voice at this very moment.