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Victory by Design: Maserati DVD
From the racer that helped establish the Maserati name in the 1920s, the Tipo 26, to the successful 8CM of the early thirties.
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The Grand Prix DVD Collection
Formula One 1970-1980
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Written by:
Robin Miller
05/04/2008 - 09:08 PM
Indianapolis, Ind.
Will Power topped the speeds among the big rookie crop. (Shawn Payne/IndyCar photo) ยป More Photos
It’s the largest rookie crop since 1997 but there’s as much quality as there is quantity in Gasoline Alley, and it showed Sunday afternoon. A dozen drivers – let’s label them first-timers instead of rookies – completed 642 error-free laps at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on an opening day that saw 10 of them breeze through their four-phase driving test.
The daunting oval that’s shaped the landscape of American motorsports for nearly 100 years offered no surprises or horror stories on a mild, sunny day.
“Surprisingly, I wasn’t nervous at all,” said 19-year-old Graham Rahal after taking only 34 laps to complete his test with a top lap of 218 mph. “I think if you get yourself all worked up about it, you get really nervous and then you makes mistakes.
“Obviously, it’s great to get this ROP out of the way and I guess I didn’t expect to go as fast as we did right away. But I’m a rookie so I don’t know what to expect.”
Teammates Will Power and Oriol Servia, who logged almost 100 laps apiece and topped 220 mph for the KV Racing entries, had different
“Man, it’s a scary place at first and going into the corners off those long straightaways it’s really fast,” said Power, the recent winner at Long Beach who posted the fastest lap at 220.694 mph. “I kept thinking, how do you get around this place flat?
“I was thrilled we were finally able to get to that point (flat out) near the end of the day but getting those next five-six mph is probably going to be the challenge. You’ve just got to be smart and you don’t want this place to bite you.”
It’s actually Servia’s second time at IMS. He tried to make the show at the last minute in 2002 and was running quick enough but broke a fuel pump.
“It’s definitely going to be fun having the whole month to work with the car and try to get competitive,” said the 32-year-old veteran from Spain. “I’ve been racing over here for 10 years and never had a real shot at Indy so I’m very excited. This place is all about getting into a rhythm and today was a good way to start. But this is like no other oval you ever see.”
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