Race Report -
Indianapolis 500
INDIANAPOLIS May 30, 2010—Vitor Meira was
headed to the front in the ABC Supply No. 14 car but
it was not to be in this year’s Indianapolis 500.
Meira made a great start going from 30th to 24th on
the first lap and by lap 28 he had worked his way
into 17th with some brilliant passes—vintage Vitor.
However, when he pitted on lap 36, the left rear
tire changer was struck by the left rear tire.
Thomas Semik was knocked into the air jack man Randy
Baden. Semik rebounded quickly and got the tire on
but the gun, hit in the melee, wouldn’t work. Going
to the spare gun cost more time as the stop was
under green. Meira went a lap down.
He explained it saying, “Part of the mishap we had
on the first pit stop was that—I had plenty of room
to come in because I had a clear pit to come in
[before his pit]. But Wheldon [whose pitbox was in
front of Meira’s] was pitting at the same time, so I
wanted to come in and put the car on an angle with
the nose pointing out. So instead of having to
swerve around Wheldon, I had a straighter shot
because this is an advantage coming out. Maybe I was
too tight and we will have to look at it and try to
improve.”
But he didn’t give up hope nor did his crew. Meira
continued to pass cars and when the opportunity came
to get a lap back, Meira stayed out while everyone
else pitted on lap 67. The gamble worked for the ABC
Supply team as the yellow came out moments after
Meira pitted. Quick pit work enabled Meira to be
back on track before the pace car came around and he
was back on the lead lap!
Once again Meira was passing cars—lapped cars and
for position and had moved into 22nd. On lap 106, he
was attempting to pass Simona De Silvestro going
through turn one when his car got in the marbles on
the inside of the short chute and the car wouldn’t
turn in turn two.
“I went to the inside of Simona and she saw me and
she even got into the marbles on the outside a
little bit because she knew I was coming to pass
her,” Meira explained. “ She didn’t do anything
wrong. She got loose, she lifted, I went low to the
inside to avoid her but there were a lot of marbles
there and as soon as I went to turn in at turn two,
I had no grip and slid up to the wall and pancaked
the right side. I should have known better. The car
was good, I was passing cars. It was a shame for the
ABC guys, everybody was here. It was not the ending
we were hoping for.”
The impact broke the right side suspension. Meira
ended up 27th.
Dario Franchitti won the race after dominating it
for most of the day. He conserved fuel in the
closing laps and a spectacular accident on the final
lap involving Mike Conway and Ryan Hunter-Reay saw
the race finish under yellow. Conway’s car got
airborne, hit the catchfence and landed upside down
between turns three and four. Conway was taken to
Methodist Hospital with a possible leg injury. Ryan
Hunter-Reay was cleared at the infield medical
center.
Dan Wheldon finished second for the second straight
year. Third through fifth across the line were Alex
Lloyd, Scott Dixon and Danica Patrick.
The team will make a quick turnaround and head to
their home state of Texas to compete in the
Firestone 550k at Texas Motor Speedway. The race
will be televised Saturday night on VERSUS starting
at 8pm ET.
Indy 500
Notes
• Vitor Meira qualified for his eighth
Indianapolis 500 with a four-lap average speed
of 224.388 mph. He will start 30th (outside row ten)
in the No. 14 ABC Supply car. Meira finished second
at Indy in 2005 and 2008, driving for two different
teams. He joined A.J. Foyt’s ABC Supply team last
year. He started 14th in that race and was running
in the top 10 when he had a blazing pit fire on lap
134 during a caution period; it was extinguished
without Meira losing a lap! He was then involved in
a spectacular accident on lap 174 with Raphael Matos
as they entered turn one. Meira sustained two broken
lower vertebra ending his season. In his first race
back in Brazil in March, he finished third, his best
finish to date with the ABC Supply team.
• The last time the No. 14 started 30th at Indy
was in 2002 with driver Airton Dare, of Brazil.
He finished 13th in that race and went on to win at
Kansas Speedway over the Fourth of July that year.
The year before, Eliseo Salazar started 28th in the
No. 14 and finished seventh.
• This race will be A.J. Foyt’s 53rd consecutive
Indy 500. He started out as a driver in 1958,
became a driver-owner in 1965 and has been solely an
owner since 1993 when he retired from driving Indy
cars on Pole Day at Indy. He was the first driver to
win the 500 four times and has won it as solely an
owner in 1999 with Kenny Brack driving.
Daily Track Report -
May 23
INDIANAPOLIS – Vitor Meira qualified for his
eighth Indianapolis 500 Sunday afternoon with a
four-lap average speed of 224.338 mph in the No. 14
ABC Supply Dallara/Honda. Meira’s speed was 26th
quickest but because he qualified after the field of
24 was set on Pole Day, he will start 30th.
The final day of qualifying, also known as Bump Day,
was filled with drama and high emotions as 13
drivers attempted to qualify for the 500 or bump
their way back into the field. Jaques Lazier
replaced A.J. Foyt IV in the No. 41 car. After
nearly 45 practice laps, Lazier made two
unsuccessful attempts to get the car qualified and
was lined up to go out a third time when the 6
o’clock gun sounded, signalling the end of Bump Day.
Foyt acknowledged it was a tough situation for
Lazier given the short amount of practice time.
After crashing two cars in two days, Tony Kanaan
found himself on the outside looking in until he was
able to post a 224.1mph qualifying run in the final
hour which landed him in 32nd position. Drivers Paul
Tracy and Jay Howard saw their teams withdraw their
qualified cars so they could make another attempt at
qualifying with the goal of posting a faster speed.
Unfortunately, neither driver succeeded in going
faster and if either of them had not withdrawn their
qualified car, they would have been in the race.
Daily Track Report - May 22
INDIANAPOLIS -- Vitor Meira and A.J. Foyt IV
will have to wait another day to qualify for the
Indianapolis 500. Both drivers made qualifying
attempts on Pole Day posting four-lap averages of
224.033mph and 223.929mph respectively. Foyt IV was
bumped with 17 minutes to go and Meira was bumped by
Mario Moraes who was the last car to take to the
track before the 4:00 gun went off, signaling the
end of qualifying for the first 24 positions.
There will be a one hour practice tomorrow morning
from 9 – 10 am and the track will open for
qualifying at 12 noon. There will be a possible 13
drivers going for nine positions during the noon to
6pm Bump Day session.
Helio Castroneves won the Pole Shootout with a
blistering speed of 227.970mph. His teammate Will
Power is second with a speed of 227.578mph and Dario
Franchitti lines up on the outside of row one with a
speed of 226.990mph.
Daily Track Report - May 21
INDIANAPOLIS – Despite the weatherman’s
predictions for today, the rain held off (except for
a few light spritzs) allowing teams to get in nearly
a full day of practice today. Vitor Meira ran a
total of 36 laps in qualifying trim with a top speed
of 224.562mph without benefit of a draft. A.J. Foyt
IV ran 49 laps and posted a top speed of 224.843
mph. The teams will have a morning practice for two
groups from 8 - 9 a.m. and then all cars will
practice from 9-10 a.m.
VITOR MEIRA: “I think today was good.
Yesterday we tried some things that didn’t work,
came back today and everything worked fine so I
think it was a good day. We were not as aggressive
as some other teams that are out there now because
tomorrow is going to be different weather-wise. We
felt we should wait until tomorrow so we’ll know the
conditions we are dealing with before we start
changing those details for qualifying. I’m
encouraged.”
A.J. FOYT IV: “It’s been an interesting day
for us, we struggled a bit earlier in the day just
trying to find a balance and we made quite a few
changes. We ended the day well so that’s what counts
and that’s important going into qualifying tomorrow.
We have a pretty balanced car and we can still trim
out more tomorrow so we’ll just have to wait to see
what we can do.”
Daily Track Report - May 20
INDIANAPOLIS--Rain curtailed practice today
at the Speedway, leaving both A.J. Foyt IV and Vitor
Meira wanting for just a little more track time.
Meira ran 33 laps with a top speed of 223.652mph
while Foyt IV logged 38 laps and a top speed of
223.845mph. With tomorrow's weather predicted to be
a washout, the drivers will be consulting with their
engineers on changes for Saturday morning's 90
minute warmup (two half hour sessions for two groups
followed by an hour session for all cars) before
qualifying begins at 11 am.
VITOR MEIRA: “All we did were qualifying
simulations today, and for whatever reason, we
weren’t as fast as we were expecting to be—-for that
matter I don’t think we were as fast as we were
earlier this week so we’re going through everything.
Today served us very well in getting the car to
where we thought we needed to be downforce-wise but
the speed didn’t translate for the amount of
downforce and drag we had so we’re checking
everything to find out why. We have to improve a
little bit, there’s something not quite right.”
A.J. FOYT IV: “We haven’t really messed with
the rear wing yet—we took a little bit of downforce
off, starting to lean more towards a qualifying
setup and we did find some more speed. The car’s
still good and comfortable so when we take more
downforce off we’ll find more speed and our balance
should still be good. The rain hurt us because we
pretty much baselined what we ended with yesterday
and we came back to make some changes and then it
started raining so we didn’t get to see what our
changes were going to do.”
Daily Track Report -
May 19
INDIANAPOLIS -- A.J. Foyt IV ran just 20 laps
today while his teammate Vitor Meira logged 70 laps
doing race simulations on yet another cool, overcast
day at Indianapolis motor Speedway. Meira’s top
speed of 224.446mph was 15th on the speed chart
while Foyt’s 222.029mph was 32nd. Tomorrow the ABC
Supply team will focus on qualifying setups as they
prepare for Pole Day on Saturday.
A.J. Foyt IV: “We just ran a few laps today
cause it was still kind of cold and we know it’s
going to be warmer tomorrow and on pole day so we
didn’t want to waste too many tires. We took it easy
today and plan on doing a lot of running tomorrow.
The ABC Supply car was still solid, we made a few
adjustments and learned a little bit but we just
didn’t run that much.”
Vitor Meira: “We stuck to the plan that we
came up with last night which was to just do race
simulations so we tried a little bit on the light
side downforce, now a little on the heavy side…not
bad. We can improve in a couple areas but definitely
we are heading in the right direction. I was able to
run with some people but not everybody I would have
liked to but we got a feel for the car so that was
the most important thing. It was a productive day.”
Daily Track Report - May 18
INDIANAPOLIS -- Despite an ever present
threat of rain and cool temperatures, the action at
Indianapolis Motor Speedway heated up as the IZOD
IndyCar Series drivers took to the track after
sitting idle yesterday due to rain. The ABC Supply
drivers primarily worked on race setups.
Vitor Meira logged 57 laps and turned in the 16th
best speed of 223.665 mph.
MEIRA: “it was good—we worked on mainly race
setup. My mindset was always race setup, maybe a
light downforce race setup but it’s good to see what
the car does mechanically. We thought we weren’t
going to run very much because of weather but we got
in 50-plus laps. We ran in traffic a little. It was
a good day. We learned a lot.”
A.J. Foyt IV posted the 12th best speed of
223.874mph after turning 32 laps for the day.
FOYT IV: “It went well today. We went out
this morning and picked up where we left off
yesterday and ran a little bit quicker. Our fast
time was in a draft but we showed some good speed by
ourselves also so the car's still solid. We’ll keep
on making minor adjustments. We were kind of in
between qualifying and race because we’re not
trimmed out for qualifying but not a lot of
downforce for the race—kind of in the middle.”
The track shut down about 10 minutes early after E.J.
Viso made contact with the SAFER barrier exiting
turn one. Viso was taken to Methodist Hospital for
further evaluation after complaining of back pain
according to Dr. Geoffrey Billows, IMS director of
medical services.
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