Co-author John Goolsby
Photo credit: Penske Entertainment | Joe Skibinski
With his shock bumping being followed by an equal shock substitute role for Sunday’s Indianapolis 500, Graham Rahal has had a whirlwind of a week at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Now that he’s had some time to settle in at in the #24 Dreyer and Reinbold entry, Rahal told Pit Debrief he feels confident in the pace of his car when the green flag drops.
“I certainly feel like we’re poised actually to have a really good run at it. I was very pleased with the car yesterday, and I think that we should come lap, you know, 170, 180, we should be in pretty good contention to be able to go after this.”
A big part of this acclimatization comes from having raced with various members of the team as well as for Dreyer and Reinbold briefly, over the course of his 17-year career in Indycar.
“A lot of the guys on the car too, like the car chief Pat [Nelson]. I worked with him in 2011 and 2012 at Ganassi, so a lot of familiar faces, a lot of familiar people, and we’re gonna go out there as I said and try to try to march towards the front and take our time.”
These connections include a what-if: teammate for this weekend Ryan Hunter-array, who was almost Rahal’s teammate at his regular ride at Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing.
“Ryan and I’ve been very close for many years. We’ve always talked about, even this year, you know, we talked about trying to get him to RLL get him in a seat. He’s a very experienced guy who’s won here before, run up front a lot here before, and so I knew that he would be a great guy to have in our camp and ultimately the way the world works sometimes is a very strange thing.”
As for his once and future teammates at RLL, in the moment at least he can take the events of last weekend in stride.
“Clearly we would have liked to just qualify on speed in the 15 car and[…] be comfortable, but we weren’t […] the way that that all unfolded was a pretty magical moment for Jack, and I fully understand that.”
The multiple IndyCar race winner also had words for Stefan Wilson, the driver who he is replacing for the race on Sunday.
“Stef is an amazing man who has dedicated a lot to be here. So I felt for him tremendously.”
