Graham Rahal and Takuma Sato look to take a promising performance for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing at Circuit of The Americas to the next NTT IndyCar Series race in nine days.
With Rahal finishing fourth and Sato seventh in the INDYCAR Classic on March 24, the first time the teammates both placed in the top 10 on a permanent road course since Road America last June. They’re hoping the momentum carries over to the Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama on another natural terrain circuit, Barber Motorsports Park, on April 7.
Rahal, piloting the No. 15 TOTAL Honda, came out ahead of several on-track battles at COTA to notch his best showing on a permanent road course since he finished third at Mid-Ohio in July 2017 – a stretch of nine races on such tracks.
“We did a great job, and I think the teams worked awfully hard to bounce back and to be in the position that we're in,” Rahal said. “Everybody's put a lot of effort into this thing. It's nice to start to see the positive starting to flow a little bit.
“I'm proud of everybody in the organization because last year was kind of a little bit brutal for us,” added Rahal, who finished eighth in the 2018 standings, his lowest result in four years. “But I felt through the offseason, through the work that we had done, that there were brighter days ahead, and I think that we saw that.”
After starting 10th, Rahal wasn’t shy about bringing the fight, even if he was met at times by a rival with more pace on COTA’s demanding and technical 3.41-mile course. On Lap 15 of 60, he and Carlin’s Patricio O’Ward went wheel-to-wheel for nearly a lap before O’Ward won out.
An advantageous caution fell on Lap 44, moments after Rahal had made his final pit stop. He cycled out to restart fourth and maintained the position to the checkered flag.
“I thought it was good wheel-to-wheel battles all day,” said Rahal, a six-time race winner. “I don't know how it looked from a fan's perspective, but for me, there was plenty of activity. I don't need much more than that. I thought it was good.”
Starting 14th, Sato traveled a more difficult path before benefiting from the same late caution to finish seventh in the No. 30 Mi-Jack/Panasonic Honda.
“Our strategy was helped by the yellow, to be honest,” said Sato, winner of the 101st Indianapolis 500. “Not particularly strong in the race. We were making progress, but it was also at the same time struggling on the pure speed.”
Sato encountered another issue on his final pit stop on Lap 41, when the airjack on his car malfunctioned.
“The airjack broke, so I lost another few places in the pit, but nevertheless, that final yellow basically helped both Graham and I lift (into the top seven) because of that. In the end, it was a good weekend, but I think in pure speed, we’ve got to work on really hard to find it.”
Barber Motorsports Park has been kind and cruel to Rahal, who has four top-seven finishes in the nine previous events, including back-to-back second-place results in 2015 and ’16. While Sato has only two top-10s at Barber, they’ve come in the past two races.
"I expect us to be good at Barber,” Rahal said, “but I expect us to be better at Long Beach (the following race) than Barber. We'll just see how it goes, though. We've all put a lot of effort into this thing, so hopefully we're good everywhere.”
Practice at Barber Motorsports Park begins Friday, April 5 with a pair of 45-minute sessions starting at 12:15 and 3:50 p.m. ET. Another practice is set for 11:45 a.m. Saturday. All practices stream live on INDYCAR Pass on NBC Sports Gold.
NTT P1 Award qualifying starts at 4 p.m. Saturday, April 6 and airs live on NBCSN and INDYCAR Pass on NBC Sports Gold.
Coverage of the 10th annual Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama begins at 4 p.m. Sunday, April 7 on NBCSN and the Advance Auto Parts INDYCAR Radio Network. Live timing and scoring accompanied by radio network commentary for all weekend sessions is available at RaceControl.IndyCar.com.
Ticket information for the race weekend can be found at barberracingevents.com.