A1 TEAM USA owner Rick Weidinger will write a diary during the Indianapolis 500 following every day that the A1 TEAM USA entry driven by Buddy Rice runs on the famous 2 1/2-mile Brickyard this May.
Sunday, May 13 (2nd qualifying day)
Our A1 TEAM USA/A1GP car will line up on the inside of the sixth row for the Indianapolis 500 on May 27. We'd like to be farther forward, but the middle is vastly superior to being in the back in a 33-car field. It's less cars for Buddy to pass to get to the front and there's less chance of getting into trouble at the start. You can win from there, as Dan Wheldon proved in 2005, and that's all that really matters.
Qualifying began at noon. We were pretty far down in the order, 39th, and decided to pass until later. We had three attempts, so we decided to take our first at 3:30 and see how it went. Buddy ran laps of 222.801 mph, 222.881, 222.768 and 222.853 for an average of 222.826. We were confident it was fast enough not to get bumped. Eleven cars had qualified yesterday and 11 were going to qualify today. We ended up fifth fastest out of the 11 today and was one mile per hour better than our qualifying attempt yesterday. We'd put four laps together at a slightly better speed than we'd practiced during the week. It was a solid effort.
Buddy has been very happy with our A1 TEAM USA/A1GP car's setup for the race. As I've written about before, we had an engine failure on Thursday just when we were going to take downforce off for a qualifying setup and we had some other mechanical problems on Friday and yesterday. We never had the time to find the optimum balance between too much downforce and not enough. It's water under the bridge. We're in the race and can get back to focusing on preparing for it. Buddy will try to run in traffic and with full fuel loads and on worn tires to simulate race conditions. How you handle in the air turbulence is one of the keys to winning.
We qualified with our race motor. Honda builds them to last 1,200 miles and issues one to each car on a full-month program for practice and qualifying and one for Carb Day and the race. We have three because of the engine failure and it has to be used for practice this week and the 500 miles in the race. The miles we have remaining on it are plenty to get the job done. I think it's an advantage to have it a little early because we can find any problems with it before the race.
A1 TEAM USA's first week at Indianapolis was a roller coaster ride. We started out smoothly, running consistently and building speed, and then had some setbacks. Our goal was to qualify in the top 11 and we were 16th. It's a mild disappointment. We have to remember that this is the Indianapolis 500 and in the world's greatest auto race, you have tremendous competition. It's why winning the race is such a fantastic achievement. We'll have our chance on May 27.
There is no practice on Monday and Tuesday. Paul, my son, and I are headed for our home in Washington, D.C., so there won't be another diary until Wednesday night.