Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing
Indianapolis 500
Verizon IndyCar Series
QUALIFYING – DAY 1 NOTES/QUOTES – May 17, 2014
RAHAL AND SERVIA PROVISIONALLY QUALIFIED 20TH AND 29TH FOR THE INDIANAPOLIS 500; THE STARTING FIELD WILL BE SET ON SUNDAY
1st: Ed Carpenter 4-lap avg. speed of 230.661 mph (L1: 39.0283, L2: 38.9841, L3: 39.0207, L4: 39.0404)
20th: Graham Rahal 4-lap avg. speed of 228.664 mph (L1: 39.3145, L2: 39.3696, L3: 39.3594, L4: 39.3929)
29th: Oriol Servia 4-lap avg. speed of 228.034 mph (L1: 39.4640, L2: 39.4613, L3: 39.4666, L4: 39.4794)
GRAHAM RAHAL, No. 15 National Guard Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “From a fan’s perspective the system works because a lot of people ran a lot today so I thought that worked fairly well. Obviously we have a lot of speed to find. We’ve got to keep working hard and try to get the car better and improve for tomorrow to get ourselves as far up the grid as possible. The goal right now is to focus. We made big changes for each qualifying attempt. I went from pretty good handling, to hanging on, to pretty good handling but went slower each time.”
ORIOL SERVIA, No. 16 Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “It’s no secret that all month we have been a little slower than we wanted. Then yesterday and today we made good improvements with the car and I honestly thought we were looking at being in the top-12 and we are not there. We were hoping to be faster than that though. Realistically we have been improving step-by-step and I think we still have more steps to go I think the new system makes qualifying interesting.”
RAHAL LETTERMAN LANIGAN RACING AT INDY … The team’s highest start and finish in the event came in 2004 when Buddy Rice won from pole. In addition, the team has earned a total of four podiums (2nd – Meira 2005; 3rd – Rahal 1994, 1995). The 2014 race will mark the 17th year for the team in the event. Prior to 2014, the team prepared a total of 30 entries for drivers such as Bobby Rahal (1992-1995), Mike Groff (1994), Raul Boesel (1995), Jimmy Vasser (2002-2003), Kenny Brack (2003, 2005), Buddy Rice (2004, 2006; DNC 2005 due to practice crash), Vitor Meira (2004, 2005), Roger Yasukawa (2004), Danica Patrick (2005, 2006), Jeff Simmons (2006, 2007), Scott Sharp (2007), Ryan Hunter-Reay (2008), Oriol Servia (2009), Graham Rahal (2010 and 2013), Bertrand Baguette (2011), Jay Howard (2011), Takuma Sato (2012), Michel Jourdain (2012) and James Jakes (2013).
NEXT UP: Final qualifying will take place tomorrow to lock-in the field. ABC will begin coverage tomorrow at 1 p.m. EDT. Timing and Scoring information is available for all sessions from www.indycar.com and includes live commentary by the IMS Radio Network.
PHOTO AND VIDEO AVAILABLE: Media members who register on the IndyCar Series media site have access to photography as well as video. Register for access to photos at: www.indycarmedia.com/pages/ApplyforAccess