Race Report: Honda Indy 200 presented by Westfield
Insurance
LEXINGTON, OH August 8, 2010—Vitor Meira drove the
ABC Supply car to a 15th place finish in the Honda Indy 200
at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course Sunday afternoon. Dario
Franchitti won the race followed by Will Power, Helio
Castroneves, Alex Tagliani and Scott Dixon.
Despite high hopes coming into a track where the team
finished in the top-10 in the last three races, Meira and
company knew they had their work cut out for them because
they were starting 24th. The field was tight with Meira less
than a second off the pole time and 18th quick overall but
because of the knockout qualifying format, he was gridded
24th. Making his task more challenging is that the 2.25-mile
road course is so difficult to pass on. Passing
opportunities come when drivers make mistakes and as the
IZOD IndyCar Series competition increases, mistakes become
fewer as the season goes on.
The team struggled in the two hours of practice before
qualifying despite having tested at Mid Ohio in June.
Saturday night they made some more changes and in the
morning warm-up, Meira was pleased with the car. Indeed he
bounced in and out of the top-10, finally ending up 16th
when the 30-minute session ended.
Meira got a good start and was in 21st after just two laps.
A full course yellow for Justin Wilson and E.J. Viso’s
accident on lap 23 triggered the first round of pit stops on
lap 25. The crew serviced him in 7.4 seconds. He came in
17th and went out 19th because two cars that were behind him
stayed out: Tony Kanaan, who was on an alternate strategy
had pitted on lap 16, and 15th place Tagliani had pitted on
lap 22, the lap before the full course yellow. Tagliani
became the biggest beneficiary. As everyone else pitted,
Tagliani moved to the head of the field followed by Kanaan.
Meira continued to run a consistent race. His second and
final pit stop on lap 56 was again under eight seconds,
allowing him to maintain his position on the track which at
that time was 18th. He picked up two more positions when
Hideki Mutoh and Graham Rahal went off track in separate
incidents. Meira moved into 15th with a pass on the lap 66
restart and that is where he stayed until the checkered flew
after 85 laps.
“Any day you make up nine positions at Mid Ohio, you can’t
complain too much,” Meira said afterwards. “It was a very
tough race and a complicated race. We learned a bunch for
next year and as tough as this series is, I feel we are
still making strides.”
The team is headed to Infineon Raceway this week to test
there on Friday, Aug 13th a week before the Infineon Indy
Grand Prix weekend. That race will be televised on Versus
starting at 5 pm ET.
Qualifying Report: Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio
LEXINGTON, OH Aug 7—Vitor Meira will start 24th in
the Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course tomorrow
afternoon. Will Power won his seventh pole of the season,
tying the series record.
The ABC Supply team made several major changes to the No. 14
car’s set-up after yesterday’s one hour practice session.
After another one hour session this morning, they made more
changes for qualifying all of which made the car work better
but it wasn’t enough.
Unfortunately, Meira’s group of 14 (determined by draw at
the start of the weekend) was much stouter than the first
group of 12 (originally 13 but Milka Duno didn’t run fast
enough in practice to attempt qualifying). Meira’s time was
18th quickest overall and was two tenths quicker than the
13th place starter on the grid (and 3.4 seconds faster than
his row mate Francesco Dracone, a rookie who starts 23rd).
But according to the knockout qualifying rules, the grid
behind the top 12 is determined by groups: the inside lane
is comprised group one cars in their order of speed while
group two comprises the outside lane.
"We're faster than 13th and starting 24th because of who was
in our qualifying group,” said Meira. “We made a lot of
improvements for qualifying but it wasn't enough for our
group. The race is long and a lot of people fall out of the
seat so there'll be opportunities to take advantage of
situations."
Notes & Quotes: Honda Indy 200 Presented by Westfield
Insurance
• Vitor Meira on Mid-Ohio: “Mid-Ohio is like a lot of
the European road courses where I began driving the formula
cars back in the 1990s. It is a flowing track and it has
elevation changes, so it has a little bit of everything. The
car has to be good overall. It’s also a smooth track that
has a lot of grip so you can attack it on all the corners.
By that I mean you can brake later than you think but you
have to have confidence you will make it – and you will
because of the grip level. It’s also a very physical
track—one of the most physical we race on. The amount of
grip makes the steering real heavy so you have to be well
rested before the race. For me that means no exercise to
speak of from Wednesday on, plus eating well and hydrating
well. I like the track and we tested there so I’m confident
it will be a good weekend for us.”
• Meira tested at Mid-Ohio June 30th. In the past
three events at Mid-Ohio, the No. 14 ABC Supply/Dallara has
had a good race set-up and finished in the top-10 in all
three races with two different drivers.
• ABC Supply roofing customer E&L Roofing LLC, of
Galena, OH won the ‘Your Name Here’ contest for the Honda
Indy 200. The company name will be atop the sidepods of the
No. 14 ABC Supply Dallara/Honda. Frank Lafferty will receive
selected merchandise, race tickets, hospitality and garage
passes, plus a Meet and Greet with Vitor Meira. The “Your
Name Here” promotion selected winners by random drawing from
a pool of entries sent in by ABC Supply customers earlier
this year.
• ABC Supply driver Walt Breeze will be the AJ Foyt
Racing honorary crew member of the race this weekend.
Walt is a driver for the ABC Supply branch located in
Vernon, OH. The honorary crew member of the race is a pilot
program being tested out in each of the company’s five
regions with Breeze coming from the northeast region.
• ABC Supply will entertain nearly 400 guests in
their hospitality tent this weekend.
• Past performance for Meira at Mid-Ohio: In his
first start at the track in 2007, Meira started 18th and
finished 17th in a tough weekend. Going for it in
qualifying, Meira spun off course relegating him to 18th for
Panther Racing. He began his march through the field and was
up to ninth when his car lost water pressure, forcing his
retirement after 54 laps. In 2008, he started 11th and
finished sixth after an early switch from wets to slicks.
• Past performance for Foyt Racing at Mid-Ohio: Last
year, Ryan Hunter-Reay, subbing for Meira, narrowly missed
the Firestone Fast Six and qualified seventh. He finished
fourth for the team’s best finish in 2009. In 2008, Darren
Manning started 21st and capitalized on changing from the
rain tires to slicks immediately after the green flag flew
as did 11th-starting Vitor Meira. Meira and Manning ran
one-two until the first full course yellow. Manning
eventually finished eighth (Meira was sixth). In 2007,
Manning started eighth and finished sixth after running as
high as third in the first stint. He was running in the
top-five for most of the race, dropping to sixth on a
restart snafu and then popping up to fourth before a dash
into the pits for a splash of fuel dropped him to sixth with
10 laps to go. The Foyt team competed in eight CART events
at Mid-Ohio in the years 1988-1995. The team’s best
start—14th--came in 1991 with Mike Groff, who dropped out
with electrical problems. Robby Gordon gave the team its
best finish—second--after starting 15th in 1993.
• The Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio will be shown live
starting at 2:30 p.m. ET Sunday, Aug. 8 on VERSUS.
• For more information on the Foyt Racing program,
please check these web sites: www.ajfoytracing.com and
www.abcsupply.com.
|
