Rossi Fastest On First Day At Road America
Photo by James Black, Penske Entertainment
“Yeah, we can do that.”
After posting the quickest time in the weekend’s first practice session for Sunday’s Sonsio Grand Prix at Road America presented by AMR, a smiling Arrow McLaren driver Alexander Rossi was either confident the track record at Elkhart Lake’s Road America would be broken, or playing mind games with with his NTT INDYCAR SERIES competitors - or both.
A new track surface has drivers circulating the 4.048-mile natural terrain road course some three-to-four seconds per lap quicker than last year’s pole winning time. Rossi’s lap of 1:41.779 is still nearly two-seconds off the all-time lap record of 1:39.866 set by Dario Franchitti in 2000.
According to Rossi, it isn’t one area where this year’s speed has been gained.
“It's everywhere, right? With the new surface, there's more grip. Yeah, I mean, it's every single corner quite honestly.”
Regarding getting the most out of the new pavement, Rossi says his approach hasn’t changed from years past.
“Really you don't do anything different. I think it's just there's more potential from the car and the tire, so you have to have probably a higher level of commitment than you did last year.
“Last year with the surface, I never thought it was particularly bumpy, but the car slid around on the track quite a bit more than it does now. It's quite a bit in the track, similar to what Watkins Glen was like when it was repaved, what Barber (Motorsports Park) was like when it was repaved. You feel the car digging in more than you did before. But everyone has that advantage now.
“Really your approach is no different whether it was low grip or high grip.”
“It’s everywhere, right? With the new surface, there’s more grip. Yeah, I mean, it’s every single corner quite honestly.”
As the weekend progresses, and cars from the various support series lay down more rubber, Rossi expects the grip level to increase.
“I think as more cars run and everything, that will obviously make the grip level continue to grow. But it's also very slippery offline, so that's an interesting thing. I think that's going to be the most interesting part of the race. Yes, the surface is a much higher grip when it has rubber on it. When there isn't rubber on it, it's borderline the same if not lower grip. It will be interesting to see how that offset from offline to online continues to grow.”
Arrow McLaren was one of the teams that tested at Road America last week, albeit not on the same compound Firestone tire the teams are using this weekend. Both of Rossi’s teammates, Pato O’Ward and Felix Rosenqvist, also posted speeds in the top ten.
A sign of good things to come this weekend?
“I think we as a group would be pretty disappointed, considering we tested here, if we didn't roll off the truck pretty strong. I think it's still early days.
“But, yes, certainly the potential is there. It wasn't a very clean run or laps by me, so I think there's certainly quite a bit more in it, which is a good sign.
“So, yeah, it's just about really diving into, again, the tire differences because it's a chunk slower than our pace in testing. So understanding the differences there and making any adjustments to the car to kind of combat that going into tomorrow.
“Obviously track evolution is going to continue being a thing, and other cars are going to keep improving, so you can't stay still, you have to keep improving.”
Photo by James Black, Penske Entertainment
Also testing at Road America last weekend was Dale Coyne Racing’s David Malukas. It proved to be beneficial for the Chicago area team and driver as Malukas was just a tick slower than Rossi at 1:41.865.
“Yeah, it was very good. We tested here, we found a couple things. At the end of the day we were kind of like, speed is still there, car feels very good. Our hopes were high coming into today.
“Obviously went out and, again, we definitely found something. I think we're a little bit closer now and kind of can restart our season. The way I'm explaining it is we had a mid-season slumber, the car was sleeping, getting ready, now we've awakened and we're ready for the second half.
“Feels really good because if you just look back from the start of the season, our expectations were that we were going to struggle on road courses. Barber, Indy GPs was kind of what we expected.
“Going into this weekend, it feels good that we've found a few things. We knew it at the test. We made some key changes. I said, Okay, well, that felt very, very good.
“Coming into this weekend, it kind of seems like we're there. Now we can kind of start focusing and making the small changes to catch up with all these frontrunners.”
“This track was already one of my favorites before, but now it’s officially taken the top spot.”
Malukas says he was shocked at how different the track is now since the repave.
“Yeah, it's massive change. I remember at the testing, when we tested last week, I was just in shock by how much more you could push the braking zones. It's almost more than double.
“Other than that, the characteristics very much the same. Carrousel, the Canada Corner all has the same feeling. Just so much more grip.
“This track was already one of my favorites before, but now it's officially taken the top spot.”
Photo by Karl Zemlin, Penske Entertainment
Whether the track record tumbles, or not, this weekend, it really doesn’t matter to Chip Ganassi Racing driver Alex Palou, who was third fastest on the day. But the current series point leader says it’s more enjoyable when it’s faster.
“Yeah, it’s better if it’s the fastest qualifying, but I don’t think we really care much. I think this course is so fun that even if we were six seconds slower we would still enjoy it. It’s even more enjoyable when it’s faster and more grip, obviously, but I don’t think it plays a big role if it’s record qualifying or record race, or not.”
Maybe that’s why Rossi was smiling at the end of the day.