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IndyCar
IN THE COCKPIT: Simona De Silvestro, Baltimore
I think we found the stride that we had at the beginning of the season, which is great, and I’m really looking forward to the next race.
Simona De Silvestro  |  Posted September 06, 2011  
After a few races where her confidence suffered, de Silvestro found the form that had the No. 78 HVM car fighting inside the top 5 at St. Petersburg. (Marshall Pruett)
SimonaDesilvestro.com


Heading into the Baltimore race weekend, there was nothing I wanted more than to be back in the United States, racing with my team. I enjoyed my time at home with family and friends, but feeling like I was “stuck” in Switzerland was horrible and I was unsure when I’d be allowed to cross the U.S. border again.

On Thursday, I got on the plane and didn’t actually breathe a sigh of relief until I made it through the Customs office. It was my birthday that day, and being able to race again was an awesome present! Plus, since I gained six hours in travel time, I actually got a 30-hour birthday!

As soon as we left the airport, we rushed back to the city for an event at the Intercontinental Hotel. I was invited to speak at the Living Classrooms Foundation dinner, benefiting their STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) program for students. The event was great – lots of people showed up and we had fun!

You’d think I’d be tired after 30 hours but after the event, I was too excited and couldn’t sleep. I convinced my driver coach, PR person and one of the Entergy executives to go for a late-night track walk with me. There were a lot of people working hard that night getting everything ready for us to go racing. The layout of the track looked great – a bit bumpy, but I could tell I was going to have fun out there.
Simona celebrates her 23rd birthday at the Living Classrooms Foundation event in the Intercontinental Harbor Court Baltimore Hotel. (HVM Racing)

The Baltimore race weekend meant a lot to me and the HVM Racing team. It felt like our home race because it’s the city where we announced our three-year partnership with Entergy Nuclear and the kick-off of the Nuclear Clean Air Energy campaign. We were also joined by AREVA, the global leader in nuclear energy.

And as always, the staff at our partner hotel, the Intercontinental Harbor Court Baltimore, took such great care of us. The hospitality was amazing! So many people from these organizations came out to support me this weekend and after the crazy season we’ve had, it meant a lot to share the time with them.

On Friday, we had a bit of delay due to track preparation, but there were A TON of fans out there! It was amazing to see such great support for the IZOD IndyCar Series and they were excited to see us on track that afternoon for the first time. Our first practice was solid and gave us a good feeling for the rest of the weekend.

Qualifying on Saturday went pretty well. We made it into the Fast 12, which was awesome. We haven’t been as strong as we’d like this season in qualifying, so that session showed me that we’re moving in the right direction.

Our morning warmup on Sunday was crazy! I think we did three laps total and ended up in P1. It sounds funny, but I’ll take it! We had changed a few things overnight and didn’t really get to experiment much – it’s always a bit weird going into a race with new changes that you haven’t run much, but I was ready.

I honestly thought that there would be a lot of yellows during the race, based on what we’d seen during practice, but it all went pretty smoothly. We had a great pace during the race, advancing positions and even leading a lap! Unfortunately, we got caught out on fuel strategy because of the long yellow, but sometimes it happens that way in racing. I don’t think our result showed how great of a race we had, but I feel good about what the Nuclear Clean Air Energy team did out there.

I realized after the race just how tough the track was. It was one of the hardest I’ve been on and it took lots of strength to maneuver. I was exhausted afterward, but I really liked it. I think we found the stride that we had at the beginning of the season, which is great, and I’m really looking forward to the next race.

Thanks to all of the fans who sent messages while I was in Switzerland, and also to those of you who came out to see us in Baltimore. I’m thankful for each of you and hope to bring home a great result from Japan in two weeks!

Learn more about Simona, her team and her sponsors at www.simonadesilvestro.com.
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Simona De Silvestro

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