Due to yesterdays typical Indiana weather, ROP was cut short and practice was canceled due to rain. A further ROP session was added for this morning and today’s practice got an early start at 10:30 am to make up for lost time yesterday. While the weather remained threatening all day, the teams took full advantage of today’s extended practice in preparation for qualifying.
Marco set quick time today at 225.478 mph followed by Helio at 225.237 mph. While Marco admitted that his time was increased by a tow, Helio danced around post practice questioning. But they were clearly not alone on track as 32 cars took practice laps today. This is a very strong showing for the IndyCar series as this means that all 32 cars will be participating in the full engine lease program. The newly announced TBA fillers for Rahal Letterman (Oriol Servia) and KV Racing (Townsend Bell) did not see action today though, as they are both participating in Honda’s 2nd week engine program (for a reduced lease price of course).
The only contact today was had by Ryan Hunter-Reay, who put in 41 laps before loosing the rear end in Turn 2 and thereby enjoying the plush SAFER barrier. Unfortunately, he does not yet seem to be on pace as he only bested Stanton Barrett’s 32nd place. This is a disturbing trend for Ryan and Vision racing as they had similar results all weekend at Kansas. The results will also be disturbing for IZOD, who are using Hunter-Reay in their national advertising campaign to sell $36 t-shirts with vintage IMS logos on them. Salty!
Stanton Barrett still has one ROP segment to finish, but in the meantime it looks like he has lost Interush as his primary sponsor. They have appeared prominently on his car for the first three rounds of the championship, but now Stanton is running with conspicuously naked sidepods. Unfortunately, Stanton’s lack of early season results, teamed with the poor economy may put him on the sidelines after Indy. But then again, if 3G and Barrett can’t pick up the pace, then they would be seeing the black flag quite a bit this season. Just ask Marty Roth what that is like.
Speaking of Marty, they hung some signs on his garage space today, but he and his equipment have not shown up yet. But Rahal Letterman Racing was seen assembling their garage space and their car, which does not appear to have any primary sponsorship yet. What ever happened to Ethanol, Patron and Argent?
Anyway, here are today’s practice results.
1 Marco Andretti 225.478
2 Helio Castroneves 225.237
3 Ryan Briscoe 224.904
4 Scott Dixon 224.448
5 Dario Franchitti 224.160
6 Dan Wheldon 224.022
7 Robert Doornbos 223.592
8 Danica Patrick 223.253
9 Graham Rahal 222.996
10 Will Power 12 222.896
11 Hideki Mutoh 27 222.745
12 Paul Tracy 15 222.671
13 Tony Kanaan 11 222.595
14 Ed Carpenter 20 222.572
15 Scott Sharp 16 222.437
16 Mario Moraes 5 2 222.150
17 John Andretti 221.910
18 Sarah Fisher 67 221.655
19 Davey Hamilton 221.624
20 Alex Lloyd 221.221
21 Justin Wilson 221.200
22 Vitor Meira 221.142
23 AJ Foyt IV 221.041
24 EJ Viso 220.942
25 Mike Conway 220.646
26 Raphael Matos 220.227
27 Ryan Briscoe 220.080
28 Milka Duno 219.745
29 Alex Tagliani 219.485
30 Nelson Philippe 219.453
31 Ryan Hunter-Reay 218.329
32 Stanton Barrett 218.089
Also, for a quick look at some of the new liveries and a good read, please check out is it May yet, they have a fantastic article up on their website with great pictures from today’s festivities. We here at Open Paddock are fan’s of Will’s snark and have just included a link to his site in our right hand sidebar, so check him out if you get a chance.
So Wheldon’s and Lloyd’s cars mark the extreme ends of colour schemes, eh? Alex’s car is brighter than the sun, and Wheldon’s car is camouflaged. Good thing its not a rally race, we’d never see Dan-o. 😉
Nice,
Added to the color scheme extravaganza is the i-drive-neon-green car ofNelson Philippe. But at least it looks better than the earth dream honda f1 entry of a couple years ago with the planet splattered on the car.
Patrick at TSO informs me that Barrett did finish ROP yesterday at 2:10. Sorry for the bad information. I should have realized my error based on his practice speeds.
Also, TSO says that Interush may never have been intended as their primary sponsor for Indy. Again, my bad.
What is clear though is that 3G is going to have to pick up the pace significantly to even make the show.