Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing
IZOD IndyCar Series
QUALIFYING NOTES/QUOTES — June 15, 2012
TAKUMA SATO QUALIFIED 14TH FOR THE
POLE: Dario Franchitti 2-lap avg. speed of 168.737 mph (L1: 168.326, L2: 169.150)
14th:
TAKUMA SATO, No. 15 Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “It was quite a tough day, very challenging. I like this track and the way you have to drive so hard. We couldn’t come to the test here and the practice session we had today was not enough to work through all of the things we wanted to try on our program. We needed more time. The car was a little sketchy and maybe a bit tipped over for qualifying and the speed we demanded and we had a little oversteer. We ended up in 14th place and with the penalty we have to start from the back of the grid. We made good progress through the sessions and will continue to work hard tonight to put all of the positive things together and make a stronger car for the race. I felt it was difficult to overtake with this configuration. The main challenge of the race will obviously be staying on the lead lap and we need to move up the positions as soon as we can. That will be challenging. Hopefully a strong car and good strategy will help us get to the front.”
FAST FACTS: Will be his second race here. He started fifth and finished 8th here in 2011 with KV Racing Technology… His best oval qualifying is pole at Iowa Speedway in 2011 and his best finish is fifth in Race 1 at TMS in 2011… Is Sato’s first season at RLL and third in IndyCar and it appears to be the start of his best season to date in the series… Sato led three of seven races this year – including 31 laps at the only other oval race this year – the Indy 500 — and nearly won the event. Has led 58 laps to date in 2012… In 34 starts in 2010-2011, has 17 career top-10 starting spots including four top-five starts and two poles (
GERRY HUGHES, Race Engineer: “We have a much better car than our starting position shows. We have a lot of data to go through on the long runs that we performed in the second practice session to give Takuma the best race car that we can. It is going to be a long race tomorrow and we want to make sure we are there at the end.”
RAHAL LETTERMAN LANIGAN RACING AT
NEXT UP: The 225-lap Milwaukee IndyFest will take place tomorrow, Saturday, June 16, and will be televised live by ABC at 1 PM (ET). It will also be broadcast by the IMS Radio Network on Sirius XM (XM 94 and Sirius 212). Timing and Scoring information is available for all sessions from www.indycar.com.