Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Speeds Increase; Dragon Needs Engines

Marco Andretti ran the fastest lap of the month to date yesterday, with an average speed of 223.676 mph. Second was three-time Indianapolis 500 winner Helio Castroneves. James Hinchcliffe, Graham Rahal and Ryan Hunter-Reay rounded out the top 5. Some notables from yesterday were Charlie Kimball who ended up sixth, Takuma Sato in ninth and the defending race winning team of Bryan Herta Autosports were eleventh with Alex Tagliani. The two Sarah Fisher Hartman entrants of Josef Newgarden and Bryan Clauson were twelfth and sixteenth respectively. Only one Lotus, Simona de Silvestro, took to the track and her fastest lap of the day was 210.315 mph, nearly a second and a half off the twenty-ninth fastest time of Rubens Barrichello. Through four days of practice, there have yet to be any accidents and only one blown engine on track which belongs to Graham Rahal.

The other recurring headline has been the legal battle between Dragon Racing and Lotus. As we are now only three days from pole day and four days from bump day, the two Dragon cars have yet to hit the track and do not have an engine at this time. The story with the driver is still the same as it was yesterday and day before that; Katherine Legge still has to complete her rookie orientation and Sebastien Bourdais has to complete a refresher program. The report has been they will have Chevrolet engines but nothing has been officially announced.

Other Notes
The total purse of this year's pit stop competition will be $100,000, with the winner receiving $50,000.

Gustavo Yacaman was the fastest at the Lights test at the Speedway on May the 11th. David Ostella, Senastian Saavedra, Tristan Vautier and Oliver Webb rounded out the top 5. Mike Larrison was the fastest American driver in seventh position. Anders Krohn was in the Bryan Herta Autosports entry and ended up ninth. Chase Austin returned to the Speedway with Juncos Racing and was eleventh and Peter Dempsey ended the day in fifteenth position. Esteban Gurrieri was the slowest of the sixteen drivers but was only 0.6765 seconds off Yacaman.