Strong Start for Ferrucci, Fittipaldi at Road America

Photo Credit: Dana Garrett/Penske Entertainment

They weren’t the two fastest drivers on track in Friday’s 75-minute practice session for this weekend’s XPEL Grand Prix at Elkhart Lake’s Road America.

That distinction belonged to Alex Palou and Colton Herta.

Driving the No. 10 DHL Honda for Chip Ganassi Racing, Palou is the two-time and reigning NTT INDYCAR SERIES champion as well as a two-time winner at Road America. Herta, in Andretti Global’s No. 26 Gainbridge Honda, won the pole for last year’s race.

But Friday turned out to be a very good day for Santino Ferrucci and Pietro Fittipaldi.

Coming off a strong month of May, Ferrucci was third fastest on Friday and has had back-to-back top ten finishes in A.J. Foyt Racing’s No. 14 Sexton Properties Chevrolet. Ferrucci is looking to continue that form this weekend at Road America.

“It's been a great week,” said Ferrucci. “We had a good car here last year with the team. We made some adjustments to kind of find some of the areas we were missing. We're pretty competitive. So I feel good about it.”

Photo Credit: Chris Owens/Penske Entertainment

Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing had a strong day, as well, with Christian Lundgaard posting the fifth fastest time in his No. 45 Hy-Vee Honda, rookie Pietro Fittipaldi was 11th in the No. 30 5-hour Energy Honda and Graham Rahal 16th in the No. 15 Hendrickson Honda.

“Yeah, it was a very good practice session,” commented Fittipaldi. “It was my first time here at Road America. There's a lot of tracks this year which I don't know, like the majority of the tracks. I only know four of the 16 tracks we're racing on.

“Every time in the first practice it's always like doing as many laps as possible on the first set of tires. Because I'm not deemed a rookie, we have one set less, right? We're always a little bit on the back foot in terms of that using a tire to try to learn the track. We did that today.

“Every time I'm getting in the INDYCAR, I'm just adapting to the new tracks quicker and quicker. I think just understanding where to extract lap time with the car, which initially with the inexperience, it's a little bit difficult. Once you start understanding it, you start getting it. To learn new tracks, the process is faster.

“Team gave me a good car today in practice. Yeah, we're pretty competitive from the get-go. Amazing circuit. Probably the best track I've raced in the U.S. or driven in the U.S. There's still many I haven't learned yet. But this one is by far number one at the moment.”

Photo Credit: Joe Skibinski/Penske Entertainment

In May, much was made of the Foyt-Team Penske technical alliance, and which team benefited the most from it. According to Ferrucci, the alliance has helped the Foyt team roll off the transporter in better shape than last year.

“Yeah, obviously I think if you look at our results, too, we have four top 10s in six races, on all tracks now, so street, road and oval. It's been a much easier, I want to say, way of rolling off of the hauler. So we unroll pretty quick.

“Last year we were actually competitive here, which was nice. We were able to take some of that and mix it in with our Penske alliance. Obviously we get some dampers from them. So putting everything together, we have a pretty good car.

“I actually feel very comfortable because it's a car I've been on before. I'm not trying to learn something new for the first time this weekend as far as setup goes.

“It's a very similar car off of Barber, as well. We're starting to find the sweet spot for me because I don't drive quite like the other three (Penske) drivers or like my teammate (Sting Ray Robb). It's been a bit of a learning curve.

Smiling, Ferrucci added “It’s nice to be quick off the trailer.”

By implication, being faster than the Team Penske trio was good, confidence-wise, at least for Friday.

“Yeah, no, they're not quite the same. They're close. But with their help, we've been able to do as well as them. It's very hard to beat a team like Penske. I mean, they won quite a few races already this year. So to be just as quick as them or even for this reference quicker, it feels really good for how small our team is.

“Still part of that speed is due to James Schnabel, who is a Penske employee, my race engineer, and them helping us out. It's pretty cool, so…”

Photo Credit: Joe Skibinski/Penske Entertainment

Being fast in the first practice at a track he’s never seen before, Fittipaldi hopes to keep evolving as the weekend continues.

“I'm the type of person that I'm never satisfied. Like we got to keep pushing. If you're not moving forward in racing, you're going backwards in you're staying the same. We got to keep working, keep improving.

“But for sure adapting to the new tracks, I've been learning them faster and faster, I've been getting more confident and comfortable in the car.

“St. Pete we finished at the end with a DQ. Thermal we made the final. Had an issue there. The next two races we got hit with quite a bit of adversity, which kind of put us a little bit on the back foot. We rebounded at the Indy GP. We had the lap one incident at the 500, but finally kind of bounced back last week.

“We just got to keep that momentum going. We've been hit with some adversity, but we just keep our head down. I know what we need to work on. Yeah, just keep moving forward.

“I would say, for sure, the goal for me is to finish in the top 10.”

Whether this was the best RLL has unloaded at a track this season, Fittipaldi couldn’t say.

“I don't know what other teams are running or what their run plan is. I was surprised we were pretty quick on the black tire. We just ran super long and did as many laps as possible. Basically like a race stint on the tire, we were still pretty fast. I think the car definitely has speed.

“So, yeah, when the car unloads like that, even if you have balance issue, the lap time and pace is there anyway. You get tracks, some places you go out, you have the same balance issues, but you're like a second off the pace. You're like, Where is the lap time?

“I think the car is definitely in a good window. As the track evolves, we've just got to make sure we're ahead of the game and stay in the window.

Photo Credit: Joe Skibinski/Penske Entertainment

After a tough weekend at Detroit for drivers and INDYCAR alike, Palou said it was great to be back at a proper race track. Ferrucci said that depends on your definition of a 'proper racetrack’.

“No street course in my mind is a proper race course. They're all very unique, very different. I would say Detroit has definitely had its challenges.

“I love street racing, I really do. It was a very tough weekend for not just us but for INDYCAR at Detroit, starting to understand how it works for us. We had a lot of cautions.

“This is what you would consider as a permanent track. One of the greatest tracks, in my opinion, across the globe, not just in the series. This is probably one of the coolest.

“Also it's a true racetrack, in my opinion. What I mean by that, it's not a paved parking lot that you see in a lot of the other series. You make a mistake here, you go off and there's something to hit. It's high stakes, high reward. The carrousel (Turn 9) has to be one of the coolest corners in motorsports.”

Photo Credit: James Black/Penske Entertainment

For Fittipaldi, Road America compares favorably to any of the iconic racetracks he’s been on around the world.

“This one, it's different, but it has a similar feeling to Spa (Francorchamps in Belgium) just because the asphalt is so smooth, the corners are so flowy, the straights are so long. You're kind of surrounded by trees and forest. It has that Spa feeling to it. It's such a long track as well.

“I mean, you feel lonely out there at times compared to the recent tracks we've been on. You have, like, cars always around you. This time I'm like, It's unbelievable, there's no traffic. Usually you get the spotter talking to you all the time. Here, because there's so much space, you're just by yourself. Spa has that same effect to it.

“What's difficult about this track is you try to do as many laps as you can to practice,” continued Fittipaldi. “Because the lap is so long, you get fewer laps and fewer attempts at each corner compared to a one-minute track.

“Your repetitions are less.

“It's harder. Like when you go out on the alternate tire at the end, actually only got one lap in, I was, like, I could have braked a little bit later here in turn 12 or 14. There's the high-speed Carousel, which I actually overshot on my lap and lost 2/10ths on the backstretch compared to my black tire run.

“It's little things. If you have one lap, it's a long track, the tires are going to last one lap, you have to send it. I overdid it, lost time. Now I know for the next one.”

Fittipaldi’s grandfather, Emerson, is a three-time IndyCar winner at Road America and uncle Christian also has a win at the 4.048-mile circuit. Of course, they had advice to share.

“Yeah, I think from the whole family,” said Fittipaldi.

“I think this track has a lot of history. Honestly, the thing about here is just gaining momentum. It's a flowy track. You need to just let the speed come. Sometimes it takes a while for the tires come in. You'll be three, four seconds off on your first push lap, and you are like, Where am I going to find the time? When the tires come in, you get a lot of lap time corner by corner. There's 14 corners at this track.

“It's just about being patient. When it's there, at the end of the day, you just got to send it. Even though it was a long time ago, the principles of racing are always the same: condense the brake zone, carry as much minimum as you can, get a full throttle as early as possible. That's basically the whole idea of how to go fast.”

Whether Ferrucci, Fittipaldi, or someone else, has anything for Palou or Herta in qualifying remains to be seen.

Saturday’s practice session gets underway at 10:00 a.m with qualifying scheduled for 2:15 p.m. local time.