Race Report: Indy Grand Prix of Sonoma
SONOMA, Calif. August 23, 2009—It was a case of good
news, bad news for Ryan Hunter-Reay and the No. 14 ABC Supply
team in the Indy Grand Prix of Sonoma at Infineon Raceway Sunday
afternoon.
After a disappointing 16th place qualifying run, the team
changed the car for the final practice causing Hunter-Reay to
remark that it was a whole new race track for him. He was
running in the top-six for most of the warm-up session before
quitting early because they were satisfied with the car.
On the first lap of the race, a chain reaction crash triggered
by the second row caused a mass scramble of cars. Hunter-Reay
did a masterful job of snaking his way through the flying
debris, and although he tagged one car with his nose, he emerged
in eighth position when the dust settled!
He ran there for the first fuel stint as he tried every which
way to pass Robert Doornbos who was slower than him. He pitted
on lap 26 and switched from the red alternate tires to the black
primary tires, getting out in 7.7 seconds. The quick stop
allowed him to pass Doornbos on the scoring chart. But on the
next lap he had a run-in with Oriol Servia, who’d just left the
pits.
Hunter-Reay explained, “He was on cold tires, I
had hot tires and got a big run on him going into the hairpin so
I put it inside of him and he turned in and tore off my front
wing.”
Hunter-Reay made it back to the pits where the team replaced the
nose assembly without losing a lap, but it was a 20-plus second
stop as the damaged wing was difficult to remove. He exited the
pits in front of the leaders and was able to pull away from
them, turning even quicker laps times on the black tires than he
had when he was trying to get by Doornbos.
On his third and final stop, the ABC Supply crew put on their
final set of Firestone red-rimmed tires and Hunter-Reay ran his
quickest laps of the race. He opened up a 12-second gap on pole
sitter and eventual winner Dario Franchitti as Hunter-Reay had
one of the fastest cars on the track.
As he closed in on 16th place, Hunter-Reay had three cars ahead
of him he could pass for position when the electronics on the
No. 14 car failed shutting down the Honda engine and bringing
his race to an end with 10 laps to go. He was credited with 19th
in the final tally. A preliminary investigation pointed to a
problem in the alternator and/or its wiring.
“We just tried to get back in the race,” he said afterwards. “We
were able to pull away from the leaders and then the car died.
The ABC Supply car was fast, it’s a shame we don’t have the
result to show it.”
For the team the good news was that they gave Hunter-Reay a good
race car at a track where they have struggled in the past. The
bad news is that the results don’t show just how good the car
was.
Franchitti won the race fending off Ryan Briscoe for the entire
75-lap distance. Mike Conway finished third with Mario Moraes
and Hideki Mutoh rounding out the top five.
Hunter-Reay To Start 16th in the Indy Grand
Prix of Sonoma
SONOMA, Calif. August 22, 2009--Ryan Hunter-Reay will
start 16th in the Indy Grand Prix of Sonoma at Infineon Raceway
tomorrow afternoon.
“We’re not very happy with the car," said Hunter-Reay after
qualifying. "We’ve got some issues that we need to sort out,
that we’ve been trying to sort all day and we haven’t been able
to get rid of them. We just have too much push in certain
corners—we’re losing almost four – tenths of a second through
one corner. So if we get that sorted out, I think we’ll be
pretty quick. Now it’s just a matter of making the car better
for warm-up and having a smart race tomorrow. We’re
disappointed. After Mid-Ohio, qualifying seventh and finishing
fourth, it’s disappointing but the way the car is handling right
now, we couldn’t do much better.”
Hunter-Reay posted his best lap of 106.785mph (1:17.6401)with
about four minutes left in his 20-minute session. It was the
13th quickest speed but the way qualifying works with the
different groups, he will line up 16th.
Hunter-Reay was 17th in the morning practice in which two
drivers received injuries requiring hospitalization. Rookie
Nelson Philippe spun at the exit of a blind turn and was hit by
E.J. Viso who had no time to react and Philippe was struck again
a moment later by an unsuspecting Will Power. Philippe and Power
suffered concussions and Philippe an open fracture to his left
foot while Power sustained compression fractures of the L2 and
L3 (lumbar) vertebrae--similar to Vitor Meira's injury in the
Indy 500.
The team will have a 30-minute final practice tomorrow morning.
The race coverage begins at 5:00pm ET on VERSUS.
NOTES & QUOTES: Indy Grand Prix of Sonoma at
Infineon Raceway
• Ryan Hunter-Reay on the key to Sonoma: “I think the key
to getting around Sonoma is having a very well-balanced car, no
big surprises. It’s a track with a lot of fast corners, a lot of
steep ascents and descents so you need a car that’s going to
stay under you for the most part. The undulations in the track
definitely make it more challenging—and fun. I think the most
fun section of the track is the first four corners—there is so
much going on. I don’t know the exact altitude climb that we do
but it’s a lot. I think I heard once that it’s six stories and
we do it in like 10 seconds. It’s a big climb from the bottom at
the start/finish line to turn four which is at the top of the
climb.”
• On his past two races at Infineon: “Well just like at
Mid-Ohio two weeks ago, we need no luck at all: no good luck and
no bad luck. In ’07 I got into it with Marco [Andretti] and it
cut my brake line, and then last year, I got turned around by
Justin Wilson.” Hunter-Reay started 7th in 2007 and eighth in
2008 but finished 18th both times.
• On momentum from Mid-Ohio: “Everybody believes in what
we’re doing and we know what our capabilities are. I mean we
were mixing it up with the top teams in IndyCar so we have every
expectation to only do better. We won’t be happy with anything
less. So we’re definitely pushing hard.” Hunter-Reay’s seventh
place start and fourth place finish is the best performance to
date this season for the ABC Supply Racing team.
• Last week, the Foyt team tested at Infineon Raceway
along with nine other teams. Foyt said, “When we started, we
weren’t happy with the car but as we worked on it, we got it
better and better. We played with springs, rocker ratios and
roll centers, about everything you could play with. We went
through a lot of stuff so I thought it was a very good test.
When we come back I think we’ll be very competitive.”
• ABC Supply roofing customer Tucker Lath & Plastering, Inc.
of Napa, Calif.won the ‘Your Name Here’ contest for this
weekend. The company name will be atop the sidepods of the No.
14 ABC Supply Dallara/Honda. Brian Tucker will receive selected
merchandise, race tickets, hospitality and garage passes, plus a
Meet and Greet with Ryan Hunter-Reay. The “Your Name Here”
promotion selected winners by random drawing from a pool of
entries sent in by ABC Supply customers earlier this year.
• The No. 14 ABC Supply car will carry an in-car camera
for the Indy Grand Prix of Sonoma which is being televised by
VERSUS. It will be shown live at 5:00 p.m. EDT Sunday, August
23.
• For more information on the Foyt Racing program, please
check these web sites: www.ajfoytracing.com and
www.ryanracing.com.
