ELKHART LAKE, Wisc. – Will Power erupted with a brief moment of fiery rage that included multiple middle fingers and grabbing the fire suit of fellow IndyCar veteran Scott Dixon after the two suffered heavy contact in Turn 13 during Practice No. 2 Saturday at Road America.

Moments earlier, Dixon had spun in Canada Corner (Turn 12) and ended up in the concrete runoff. Having managed to keep his car running, Dixon got back onto the racing surface and trundled slowly on the right side of the track as he headed toward Turn 13. As he said after he was seen and released from the infield care center, the Chip Ganassi Racing driver simply did not see Power, who was running directly behind a hard-charging Romain Grosjean at the time. Dixon waited for the Andretti Autosport driver to pass and then lunged out wide into the middle of the track – and directly into Power’s line.

The No. 12 Chevy’s right-front ran square into the left-front of Dixon’s, sending Power’s car hurtling toward the concrete wall, where the left side of his car made heavy contact. Dixon’s car hit it nearly head-on and then whipped around to make additional contact with his left-side as well.

‘What the (expletive)? What the (expletive)?’ Power could be heard yelling over his radio.

He then quickly unbuckled himself and stepped out of his car and turned to face Dixon, appearing to flash his contemporary the ‘double birds’ – something he made famous during a rage-filled incident in 2011 at Loudon, when race control restarted a race on a wet track. Power then stomped over to Dixon, helmet still on as Dixon took his off and attempted to explain himself. Power then grabbed the collar of Dixon’s fire suit and shoved him away before two members of the AMR safety team could get in the middle of them.

Power then made a second lunge at Dixon before walking away toward the trucks, kicking a piece of Dixon’s wing and flashing the Ganassi driver one last middle finger for good measure.

“I didn’t realize Power was even there,” Dixon said on the Peacock broadcast from outside the care center. “Really sorry for him and his team. Yeah, a mistake on my behalf, and I feel frustrated for wrecking out car, as well as his.

“We ended up getting into the car (together) and going back, and (Will) was fine after that. Everybody gets pretty fired up, especially with how tight things are (in the championship race) at the moment. It is what it is, but I just feel bad for the situation.”

Once TV crews got to Power after he’d been seen and released from the care center, last year’s season champ had indeed seemed to have mellowed on it all, but his frustration still lingered. The Penske driver had been sitting 10^th on the timing charts at the time of the incident after finishing a frustrating 17^th on Friday, only slightly behind his teammates (Scott McLaughlin, 15^th, and Josef Newgarden in 16^th).

“Scott just moved abruptly, and I was coming. It was a very unfortunate incident, just nothing I could really do, and I didn’t expect him to move,” he said. “Such a pity. I felt like I had a pretty good car, but we’ll go and rebuild it and see what happens there.”

At the time of contact, both crews had around 2.5 hours to repair their respective cars ahead of Saturday afternoon’s qualifying session (1:55 p.m. ET/12:55 p.m. local), and even shorter by the time the cars made their way on the back of the hooks to the paddock.

The incident was one of five red flags in Saturday morning’s practice, which started seven minutes in with series points leader Alex Palou spinning and going through the gravel trap on the outside of Turn 14 backwards, eventually slamming the tire barrier with the right side of his car. Dixon and Power’s incident immediately followed. A few minutes later, Marcus Ericsson lost it in Turn 14 but managed to keep going through the gravel, while Santino Ferrucci simultaneously spun and stalled in Canada Corner, forcing the third red flag. Colton Herta did the same as Ferrucci, forcing the fourth, and the session ended with Simon Pagenaud hurtling through the Turn 14 gravel pit and kissing the tire barrier for the final stoppage.

More than seven minutes of green flag running was lost to all the stoppages, with 45 minutes of running available, provided it happened in the hour-long window that served as the hard-out for the practice session. For the second consecutive day, Arrow McLaren's Alexander Rossi finished fastest on the timing charts (1:40.9112) at the track he started on pole at a year ago with Andretti Autosport.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: IndyCar: Will Power fiery after crash with Scott Dixon at Road America