Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing
Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama
Verizon IndyCar Series
QUALIFYING NOTES/QUOTES — Saturday, April 22, 2017
RAHAL WILL ATTEMPT TO EARN A THIRD STRAIGHT PODIUM FINISH IN THE HONDA INDY GRAND PRIX OF ALABAMA FROM 21ST PLACE START
1) Will Power 1:06.9614 / 123.653 mph (Group 2, Round 3)
21) Graham Rahal 1:08.0499 / 121.675 mph (Group 2, Round 1)
GRAHAM RAHAL, No. 15 Rahal Letterman Lanigan Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “We’re all sliding around, it’s just the level at which you are doing that. We can’t seem to get the tire to bite the road at all. I had nothing else for qualifying. This morning I put in one miracle lap but couldn’t get within half of a second of it again. That’s what we have been banking on in qualifying. It got us through once in St. Pete and got us into the Fast Six in Long Beach but we weren’t able to do that today. We have to unload competitive right away because we don’t have a second car to split the workload and try different setups, spring rates or anything. For us as a single car team it’s impossible to catch up over a race weekend. We’ve always been good here, we want to win races and get the PennGrade car in Victory Lane.”
RLL AT BARBER: The 2017 Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama will mark the sixth IndyCar Series race for the team at Barber Motorsports Park (BMP). The past two years, RLLR and Rahal played a major role in exciting races and earned the top finish for the team of second place each year (more details above). In 2014, Rahal finished 17th after running as high as 10th but was hit by two cars. Servia started 19th, ran as high as 14th and finished 20th. In 2013, Rahal set a lap time fast enough to progress to Round 2 and qualify in the top-12 if he had been in Group 2 but he was in Group 1 and ultimately qualified 21st. He had to pit for a new nose on the opening lap after the field checked up and he hit Oriol Servia. He moved up to 12th place but ran out of fuel on the final lap due to a malfunction in the fueling system and dropped to 21st. James Jakes qualified 11th in 2013 but had to pit early in the race when the camber shims fell out of the left rear upright which put him two laps down to the leader. He soldiered on through fueling issues, set the fastest lap of the race and finished 23rd. In 2012, Takuma Sato set the third fastest time in Friday’s first practice for the team and was fastest in the wet second session but traffic limited his qualifying performance to 16th. In the race he passed four cars for 12th place on red alternate tires but struggled on primary tires and ultimately retired in 24th place due to mechanical failure after 52/90 laps.
NEXT UP: Warmup will take place tomorrow from 9:45 – 10:15 a.m. CT and the 90 lap Honda Grand Prix of Alabama will be televised live on NBCSN from 3:00-6:00 PM ET Sunday, April 23.
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: http://www.indycarmedia.com/pages/ApplyforAccess