Romain Grosjean poses for a photo after qualifying for the Indianapolis 500 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Indianapolis on May 18, 2024. (AP file photo)

INDIANAPOLIS — Romain Grosjean used some humor — and cited his Swiss roots — to punch back at his feud with Marcus Armstrong on Thursday.

Hey, it’s worth a shot.

Grosjean insisted he never intended to fight Armstrong when he said he wanted to hit him during a post-race dust-up on pit lane after the two IndyCar drivers collided during the Indianapolis Grand Prix. Instead, Grosjean called Saturday’s clash a misunderstanding in the heat of the moment.

“I’m Swiss,” he said when asked if he’d ever punched someone. “I think the whole thing got misinterpreted because some people that had no right to be involved got involved. Marcus crashed into me, got a drive through (penalty) for it, and it ruined my race.

“It was a top five easy, if not better. So we had the discussion, and I said, ‘I want to punch you,’ like as a joke, and that’s when mechanics got involved and started pushing me back. All I wanted was to speak with Marcus.”

But when Grosjean started yelling at Armstrong, his Meyer Shank Racing team members tried to de-escalate the situation by stepping between the drivers.

Armstrong still seemed taken aback when he spoke with reporters Tuesday, saying he only wanted to address it one time.

Armstrong acknowledged he’d “dive-bombed” Grosjean’s car on the speedway’s 14-turn, 2.439-mile road course and suspected Grosjean might be upset by what Armstrong called a clean move. He still seemed surprised someone he considers a friend confronted him in that manner, which caused an unnecessary distraction with this season’s biggest race looming on May 24.

So Armstrong made light of the situation, too.

“I’m thinking about taking up boxing,” he joked. “But in all seriousness, it’s not a problem. We just had a bit of a kerfuffle on track. We kind of made contact and I was fully up alongside him and we made contact, which happens in IndyCar racing, and afterward, he was pretty angry.”

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