A Revitalized Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Flexes Its Muscles in Indy Qualifying
Photo by Chris Jones, Penske Entertainment
Leading a revitalized Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing team, Christian Lundgaard won the pole for Saturday’s GMR Grand Prix on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s road course. Driving the Hy-Vee Honda, Lundgaard’s lap of 01.09.3321edged the Arrow McLaren Chevrolet of Felix Rosenqvist by .0027 of a second, the closest margin in Firestone Fast Six history.
It was the first pole of the young Dane’s career and the first for the team since Takuma Sato took the top spot in qualifying in August of 2020 on the oval at World Wide Technology Raceway.
But it wasn’t just Lundgaard who showed speed. Teammate Jack Harvey qualified 4th and Graham Rahal 8th.
“Honestly, right now it feels awesome getting my first NTT P1 award, but with that said, Jack is P4 and Graham is P8. That is the best qualifying we've had in those two years that we've been teammates.
“I think it shows the progress that we're on. It's taken a little longer than we would have liked, but now we've got to finish it off tomorrow, but I'm just super happy for the team.
“My podium here last year, it was a big relief for me and the team. I knew my ability to be able to finish on the podium. I know what I'm capable of. But to deliver it to the team is what meant the most to me, and this, too. Everyone works so hard. We built a new facility. It hasn't paid off until now, so we're going to keep digging deep.”
Let’s be honest. The 2023 version of Rahal Letter Lanigan Racing didn’t look much better than the one that disappointed the year before.
The new, state of the art facility just outside of Indianapolis was going to improve the team’s fortunes. New technical director Stefano Sordo was brought onboard from the McLaren Formula One team to help the team move forward and become a consistent front runner.
But four races into the NTT INDYCAR SERIES season, the results didn’t look much different from 2022 with Lundgaard 12th, Rahal 16th and Harvey 23rd in the standings heading to Indy. But from Lundgaard’s perspective, a day like Friday was a great reward for the team’s hard work.
“All the resources that's been put into this has not been rewarded up until now. The podium here last year was a step, and we had a very good end to the season last year, but we weren't able to continue that going into the beginning of this season, and it annoyed me a lot because obviously I'm asking the questions, what have we done different. There wasn't really anything that was dramatically different that should drastically change it as much as it was from the end of the season to the beginning of the season, so now sitting here I'm only proud of this team. Everything we've achieved up until now, I would say we set the benchmark in Barber (Motorsports Park) a couple of weeks ago where we were pretty much consistently sixth throughout the whole week, to now start off with a pole.
“Once these days come, we expect to be here, but we've also got to reward ourselves and understand that all the hard work does pay off eventually, and I think this is just a sign of hard work paying off, but we also need to keep in mind the race is tomorrow, we need to win tomorrow's race, and that's the target.”
Photo by Chris Owens, Penske Entertainment
Is this the breakthrough the team has been looking for? Lundgaard hopes it is.
“Leaving Barber, I was very satisfied with our whole weekend. I was quick all weekend, but the most satisfying thing about that race was the momentum carries on, and we saw that last year. We saw we had a big improvement in Toronto, and we kept on building on top of that, and at the end of the season we were extremely competitive.
“We didn't see that coming into the beginning of this season, and we had this performance a lot earlier in the season this year. I remember from last year how much momentum helps and will carry through.
“To get it that early in the season is a big benefit for us, but obviously we shouldn't really just rely on that, but it's a good thing to keep in mind.”
When Lundgaard made his IndyCar debut on the Speedway’s road course in August of 2021, he impressed everyone. Last year, in his first full season of IndyCar racing, Lundgaard won rookie of the year honors. Although thrilled to get his first pole, Lundgaard hoped it would’ve come somewhere else.
“Well, I would have hoped it came sooner. Whenever it comes, I hope it was the right time to do it. The one thing I was annoyed about having my podium here last year was I didn't want to have it here because I did my debut here and I didn't want people to think this was just the track that I was fast at, and we showed up in Nashville and was P1 in the first session the weekend after.
“This is what I want to do now. Now we're starting the race from pole, but we also need to win the race. We need to take it step by step and see what we can do tomorrow and back it up for the proper month of May.”