POLE: Will Power 1:01.3721 / 105.585 mph (set in Round 3)
15th Takuma Sato 1:02:6015 / 103.512 mph (set in Round 1; Group 1)
TAKUMA SATO, No. 15 Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “We made progress after the practice this morning and found some things to improve the handling of the car but we weren’t able to go to the next stage of qualifying which is disappointing. The race will be interesting because it will be the first time competing together with the new racing package. We will gather data tonight to give us an idea of what to expect in race trim and will know more at the warm-up.”
GERRY HUGHES, Race Engineer for Sato: “We are disappointed with our qualifying performance. I think that we’ve made some gains from where we were at the end of P3 (third practice). We obviously had to make some changes to the car for the alternate tire, which we hadn’t run until this point, and I think we made some improvements in terms of balance on the softer compound and we will have to see how those transfer to the morning warm-up. Then we will have to combine those with some further changes in terms of targeting an optimal race balance for tomorrow.”
RAHAL LETTERMAN LANIGAN RACING AT ST. PETE… 2012 will mark the 21st consecutive season of competition for the team. It will be the fifth IndyCar race for the team in St. Pete and the ninth car entered. The team prepared Indy cars for Danica Patrick (2005, 2006), Buddy Rice (2005, 2006), Vitor Meira (2005), Jeff Simmons (2007), Scott Sharp (2007) and Ryan Hunter-Reay (2008) prior to this year. The team led the race for four laps with Hunter-Reay in 2008 (G. Rahal won) and has earned three top-10 finishes with the best being fifth by Meira in 2005. The highest starting position by the team is sixth place by Hunter-Reay in 2008.
NEXT UP: The pre-race warm-up will take place from 8:35-9:05 a.m. The season-opening Honda Grand Prix of