Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing
Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach
Round 16 of 16 in the NTT INDYCAR SERIES
PRACTICE NOTES/QUOTES – Friday, September 24, 2021
PRACTICE 1 FOR THE ACURA GRAND PRIX OF LONG BEACH INCLUDED THE USUAL SESSION STOPPAGES; MORE TO COME ON SATURDAY FOR RAHAL, SATO AND ASKEW
1) Colton Herta 1:09.2680 / 102.281 mph
19) Graham Rahal 1:10.5113 / 100.478 mph
21) Takuma Sato 1:10.7675 / 100.114 mph
26) Oliver Askew 1:11.2253 / 99.470 mph
GRAHAM RAHAL, No. 15 Total Quartz Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “Practice 1 has come to a close. It’s not the start that we wanted for the weekend I think. Frankly we didn’t start well in Laguna either, but I think we’ve just got to make a few tweaks. It was kind of a messy session on my end. I think I only got one or two clear laps. I’m happy that my fastest lap was on an out lap and well as my very last one that matched it. We saw that a lot of other guys ran new tires towards the end of the session and we did not. So, I think we’ll be okay in the end but we definitely have some work to do tonight to make the Total Quartz car a little quicker.”
TAKUMA SATO, No. 30 Panasonic / Shield Cleansers Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “It was a short session again for one last race (of the season) we come back here after nearly two-and-a-half years. It’s a really nice, great atmosphere and there is fantastic support from the fans. The session was a bit tricky with so many yellows and people going off all over the place and red flag’s so I think we only achieved a quarter of what we wanted. But just get back to rhythm, and I think we need a long list to look at it for tomorrow but it’s really nice to be back in Long Beach.
OLIVER ASKEW, No. 45 Hy-Vee Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “Unfortunately Practice 1 ended a bit early for us. I made an error through Turn 1 and clipped the wall. But we did get some good quality running there in the beginning so I think tomorrow we can put our best foot forward and continue from there.”
3 POLES, 6 PODIUMS FOR RLL IN 20 INDY CAR RACES AT LONG BEACH: This marks the 21st time for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing (RLL) to compete in the main event. In total, the team has won three poles (Herta 1998, Vasser 2002, Jourdain, Jr. 2003); made five front row starts including an all-Team Rahal front row in 1998 (2nd – Rahal 1998, Brack 2001); earned their best finish of second place four times (Rahal 1992-1993, Vasser 2002, G. Rahal 2013) and earned six podiums here (2nd – Rahal 1992-1993, Vasser 2002 & G. Rahal 2013; 3rd – Herta 1998-1999). Although the team didn’t compete in Indy car races here from 2004-2011 while they fielded a fulltime entry in the Indy Racing League (2004-2008), they did compete in the 2003 and 2004 Atlantic races with Danica Patrick and in the 2007 American Le Mans Series (ALMS) race.
NEXT UP: Practice will take place Saturday morning from 9:00-9:45 a.m. PDT and qualifying will take place from 12:05-1:20 PM PDT. Peacock will begin live coverage of qualifying at 3 p.m. EDT Saturday. Timing and Scoring information is available for all sessions from www.indycar.com. The Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach will be televised live on NBC Sports beginning at 3:00 p.m. ET Sunday, September 26.