Today we look at the winners of the 2004 Indianapolis 500 and that would be Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing. The Ohio-based team hasn't won a race since Ryan Hunter-Reay took victory at Watkins Glen in 2008.
2013 Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Review:
Wins: 0
Best Finish: 2nd (Long Beach, Belle Isle 2).
Poles: 0
Best Start: 2nd (Belle Isle 2).
Final Championship Position: 18th (Graham Rahal), 19th (James Jakes).
2014 Drivers:
Graham Rahal
In his first season with his father's team, Graham Rahal struggled, scoring only five top tens in nineteen races and is approaching six years since his first career victory at St. Petersburg in 2008. He had a few flashes of success in 2013. At Long Beach, Rahal fought his way up to second from eleventh on the grid. He scored a pair of ninths at Belle Isle. Iowa saw Rahal win his heat and advance to the final heat. He started in the top ten and came home in fifth. His final top ten came at Houston, when he started 24th in race one after an engine change and finished seventh. However, Rahal average start in 2014 was 17.7 and average finish was 14.7.
Number to Remember: 12,698,967.47. Budget requested by RLLR from the National Guard to run the car.
Prediction/Goals: Rahal has to win a race and he has 12,698,967.47 reasons to do so. Rahal arguably has one of the largest budgets on the grid and after seeing Panther Racing going 0-for-104 with a larger budget, the team has to get results this year. One thing Rahal has to improve on is qualifying. In 2009, Rahal started in the top ten for fifteen of seventeen races. Last year, he started in the top ten for two of nineteen races. Rahal will improve, get a win cause he has to and be fighting for a spot in the top ten of the championship.
Oriol Servià
The Spaniard's 2013 season was a typical year for him. Dreyer and Reinbold Racing closed their doors, leaving Servià without a ride only to put together a partial season with Panther Racing. He started 2013 off on a good foot with a sixth at Long Beach, fourth at São Paulo and an eleventh at Indianapolis but it wasn't enough to keep D&R afloat. Servià's 2014 is already lining up to be a mirror of 2013. He has four races lined up with RLLR (Long Beach, Barber, Grand Prix of Indianapolis and the Indianapolis 500). After that, your guess is as good as mine.
Number to Remember: 10.3. Servià's average finish in 40 starts in Honda-powered cars.
Prediction/Goals: The goals should be to turn four races into eighteen. Servià is the veteran driver RLLR needed last year when they were lost and we will see Servià in a car beyond Indianapolis for RLLR. Servià has never been a flashy driver but two or three top ten in his four scheduled races is not out of the question.
Remember, the first round of the 2014 Verizon IndyCar Series season is the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg and can be seen live March 30th at 3:30 p.m. ET on ABC.
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