Rahal, Lundgaard & Fittipaldi Were Sixth, 17th and 20th in Practice 1 for the Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio; First Hybrid Session Impacted by Light Rain

Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing

Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course

NTT INDYCAR SERIES

PRACTICE NOTES/QUOTES – July 5, 2024

RAHAL, LUNDGAARD AND FITTIPALDI WERE SIXTH, 17TH AND 20TH IN PRACTICE 1 FOR THE HONDA INDY 200 AT MID-OHIO; FIRST PRACTICE SESSION WITH THE HYBRID IMPACTED BY WET CONDITIONS

1) Alex Palou 1:07.0650 / 121.208 mph

6) Graham Rahal 1:07.7452 / 119.991 mph

17) Christian Lundgaard 1:08.3723 / 118.890 mph

20) Pietro Fittipaldi 1:08.7307 / 118.270 mph

GRAHAM RAHAL, No. 15 Fifth Third Bank Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “It was a good session; we ended P6. The repave is good and the track is silky smooth. It’s a little bit light on grip which I think is going to get a lot better as we go throughout this weekend because a lot of cars haven’t run. We ended P6 but when we did our best lap, it put us P1 at the time, which held for a while. I think some guys ran later in the session with new tires like Palou, Rossi, and guys like that didn’t run when we did so, from that standpoint, I thought we were competitive. Getting used to this hybrid is going to be a challenge. There’s so much more to do, there’s so much more to change and a lot to think about but the Fifth Third Bank car has a great starting spot here so let’s see how it goes tomorrow.”

FAST FACTS: The 2024 Honda Indy 200 will mark Rahal’s 18th Indy car race at his home track. His best start is second in 2023 and 2017 and his best finish is his win here in 2015. He has finished in the top-five, six times in his past 10 races here. In total, he has one win (2015), two podiums (2017), six top-five and 11 top-10 finishes in his 17 races here including a pair of fourth place finishes in the doubleheader in 2020. In 2023, he lost pole by a mere four-hundredths of a second to Herta and matched his best INDYCAR start at home of second place. He led the race two times for two laps total and finished seventh after a slow fuel probe plug in on his first stop and an issue getting his inside rear tire on in his second. In 2022, he qualified 18th and finished 12th after struggling with the handling of the rear of his race car. In 2021, he started eighth and finished sixth. Year-by-year recaps are available upon request. He has also competed in many other series at his “home track.” In addition to Indy car races here, at the age of 16 in 2005, Rahal became the youngest to claim the SCCA National Formula Atlantic championship at the SCCA National Championship Runoffs here by a dominant 43-seconds. He also competed in the Star Mazda race here in 2005 (S/F 4/9) and tested a Grand Am car here in 2007…. He is 16th in series point standings with a total of 127.

PIETRO FITTIPALDI, 30 Mi-Jack Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “It was a pretty short session and a bit chaotic as well with traffic. It was more about feeling the hybrid out a bit and we couldn’t quite get much of a read with the car because it was so hard to get a clean lap and then there were red flags. But the hybrid system is pretty straight forward for me at least. I adapted to it pretty quick but we will be able to tell more tomorrow how it is and where we are in terms of pace.”

FAST FACTS: The Honda Indy 200 will mark Pietro’s second INDYCAR race at Mid-Ohio. In 2018, he competed for Dale Coyne Racing where he started 22nd and finished 23rd… He is 19th in series standings with 97.

CHRISTIAN LUNDGAARD, No. 45 Hy-Vee Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “The difference since last year here is obviously the hybrid system and it changes the weight distribution, changes certain aspects in the setup and I think we didn’t quite hit it on the 45 car before the rain came. I think there is a little bit more for us to gain. We were lacking a little bit of entrance stability that we didn’t get to try to improve because of the rain. We had some other things on the systems side that we just wanted verified and that’s why we went out in the wet. There is more to come tomorrow for sure.”

FAST FACTS: Lundgaard will make his third start at Mid-Ohio. In 2023, he narrowly missed out on a podium finish with fourth place after starting fifth and matched his best finish of the season to that point. In 2022, he started 16th and finished 11th. He is hoping to continue the trajectory and podium potential shown last year… He is ranked 11th in the point standings with 156.

RAHAL LETTERMAN LANIGAN RACING AT MID-OHIO … The 2024 Honda Indy 200 will mark the 28th Indy car event for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing (RLL) at Mid-Ohio Sports Car course, near the team’s original base of Hilliard, Ohio. The team also competed in the Atlantic Series race in 2003 with Danica Patrick and has competed in ALMS races here in 2007 and from 2009-2012 and IMSA races since 2018 when the team competed in the GTLM class. The team has earned four podiums (1st – G. Rahal 2015; 3rd – B. Rahal 1997, 1998, G. Rahal 2017), 16 top-five’s and 26 top-10 finishes at the track and the highest start is pole (Herta 1997). Another front row start came in 1999 (Herta; 2nd).

NEXT UP: Practice 2 will take place tomorrow from 10:50 – 11:50 a.m. ET and qualifying will be 3:00 – 4:30. Both will air on Peacock. Timing and Scoring information is available for all sessions from www.indycar.com and includes commentary by the INDYCAR Radio Network.