Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing
KOHLER Grand Prix at Road America
Verizon IndyCar Series
PRACTICE NOTES/QUOTES – June 23, 2017
RAHAL SET THE EIGHTH FASTEST TIME IN PRACTICE FOR THE KOHLER GRAND PRIX
1) Josef Newgarden 1:42.8229 / 140.537 mph
8) Graham Rahal 1:43.7540 / 139.276 mph
GRAHAM RAHAL, No. 15 GEHL / D-A Lubricant Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “It was a good day but I would like to have been a little quicker, a little more competitive. We ended up eighth and certainly have some work to do but we’re going to keep our heads down and keep working hard here to get the GEHL / D-A Lubricant Honda closer to the top of the timesheets. We didn’t start where we would like to be but it’s important for points that we remain in the hunt every single day so we’re going to work hard tonight to try to come up with a setup combination that’s going to work better. It certainly isn’t coming easy to us but we tried a lot of different things today, tried to accomplish a lot but didn’t get a great direction. We’ll keep on it and see what happens tomorrow.”
SPECIAL HELMET FOR ROAD AMERICA: Graham Rahal is wearing a special helmet for the KOHLER Grand Prix as part of a fundraiser for Mercy Home for Boys & Girls in Chicago, who has been helping children escape poverty, abuse and neglect since 1887. The opportunity to create a design for his helmet at Road America was auctioned off at a Ringside black-tie fundraiser event in October 2016 as part of an IndyCar Series and Indy 500 experience package donated by Bobby and Johanna Rahal that raised over $50,000 for Mercy Home for Boys & Girls. Bobby Rahal’s wife, Johanna, is on the Board of Regents for the home, and was recently appointed to the six-member Board of Directors. Ross Bartels cast the winning bid and designed the helmet which was donated by Bell and will be signed after the race and presented to him. The ringside event colors are red, black and white and those colors, along with artwork designed by one of the children at the home are incorporated into the design.
RAHAL LETTERMAN LANIGAN RACING AT ROAD AMERICA … The 2017 KOHLER Grand Prix at Road America will mark the 14th time for the team to compete in an Indy car race here and second since 2003. The team competed in CART and Champ Car-sanctioned races here from 1992-2003 and again in 2016 with a best starting position of pole by Kenny Brack in 2001 and best finish of second place by Bobby Rahal in 1996. The team has earned a total of five podium finishes here (2nd – B. Rahal 1996; 3rd – B. Rahal 1992-1993, Kenny Brack 2000, Graham Rahal 2016). The team has also competed in ALMS and IMSA-sanctioned races here under the name BMW Team RLL since 2009 and has three wins (2009, 2010, 2012), three poles (2009, 2011, 2014) and a total of eight podium finishes here.
NEXT UP: Practice 3 will take place tomorrow from 11:00-11:45 a.m. CT and qualifying will take place from 3:00-4:15. NBCSN will broadcast qualifying coverage on a tape delayed basis at 5:00 PM ET Saturday. Timing and Scoring information and live streaming video is available for all sessions from www.indycar.com and includes live commentary by the INDYCAR Radio Network. The KOHLER Grand Prix will be televised live on NBCSN beginning at 12:30 PM ET Sunday, June 25.
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