Grosjean, who topped his first-ever practice session as an Andretti driver ahead of teammate Colton Herta, explained his “rebirth” through IndyCar after his ten seasons in Formula 1 – which ended with the horrendous fiery accident in Bahrain.
“It felt amazing,” said Grosjean of being voted #1 by fans. “After only one year in IndyCar, to be voted the most popular driver has been quite incredible.
“I’ve got a story, I come from 10 years in F1, the fire and coming back to racing in IndyCar, discovering a championship where I think it was a reverse.
“I use the ‘Phoenix’ as a nickname not because of the fire, it’s related to a rebirth of myself through IndyCar, having fun and enjoying myself.”
Conducted in 11 languages across the Motorsport.com platform and receiving feedback from over 53,000 fans in 147 countries, Grosjean was voted the survey’s most popular driver with 32% of fans placing him in their Top 3 and nearly 12% of fans ranking him their favourite driver.
Grosjean added: “The fans give me so much, and I tried to give back on all my experiences in the States, driving my RV, eating far too many donuts, barbecue on the first of January in Florida, which is amazing.
“I’m almost as American as Colton. My pronunciation is still a bit French but I’m working on it. He’s working the same hairstyle as I was when I was his age!”
On his pacesetting form in Friday’s sole practice session, Grosjean said he has a strong baseline to work from for the rest of the weekend ahead of the season-opening race.
“It felt good, the car was performing well,” he said. “Obviously quite a bit of traffic out there, but nice to put in a lap, and we did a couple of test items to get a read.
“I think we’ve got a very, very strong baseline, but I think there’s a little bit more to come if we put it all together. Hopefully we can find that and have fun for the rest of the weekend.”