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Vitor Meira Finishes 10th, Moves to 9th in IZOD IndyCar
Series
KANSAS CITY, KS May 1, 2010—Vitor Meira and the ABC
Supply Racing team finished 10th in the RoadRunner Turbo Indy
300 at Kansas Speedway today and moved from 11th to ninth in the
IZOD IndyCar Series standings. Meira kept his record intact at
Kansas of finishing in the top-10 if he finishes the race. Today
was the fifth time he did so in eight starts.
“We needed more grip towards the end of the run but on the short
run, the car was awesome fast and I was able to keep up with
anyone,” Meira said afterwards. “It was just a problem with the
older tires. But the ABC Supply/AJ Foyt team has put us in a
good position going into Indy.
It was Meira’s first time back on an oval track in nearly a year
but he looked like he hadn’t missed a beat. Afterwards he said,
“Ovals are intense! After all these months out of the car and
not racing ovals continuously, ovals are intense! I’m glad to be
back and I like this feeling.”
Meira started sixth for his best start of the season and moved
into fourth by lap seven, and was closing on the leaders.
However, by lap 27, he radioed in that the car was losing grip.
As the stint wore on the condition got worse.
That was pretty much the story of his race. He would run strong
at the beginning of the fuel run but then would have to slow as
the car lost its grip. Since it wasn’t something that could be
fixed in a pit stop, he had to make the best of the situation
which he did.
“I was always strong on restarts, Jeff [Britton, chief engineer]
did an awesome job with the gears and the car was good with new
tires,” Meira explained. “I was very confident from the get-go.
I knew I could go inside or outside of traffic on restarts. Our
problem was near the end of the run. The important thing is
we’re learning every day, we got two positions for the
championship, and if we do that every weekend, we’ll be good.”
The ABC Supply crew turned in solid pit stops all day but
congestion on pit road saw Meira use good judgment on several
occasions to avoid colliding with other cars. He lost several
positions in two instances but he avoided the situations which
would have put him out of the race.
Larry Foyt, who ran the team the entire weekend because his
father A.J. was at the Kentucky Derby this weekend, summed up
the day by saying, “The race started really well for us, and the
car was really fast. But we noticed that we lost the handle a
bit on older tires so I think we might have been just a little
too aggressive on our setup. Once he got into some traffic,
Vitor was just struggling for grip. He hung in there, did a good
job and I’m glad we got a top 10. We showed some speed which I
think is good and I think we learned a lot that’s going to help
us on our set-up for these mile and a half tracks. It was a good
step in the right direction. It was a little bit frustrating
because we showed so much promise and wanted to finish really
well but it was still a decent result in the end.”
The IZOD IndyCar Series heads to Indianapolis in two weeks where
they will begin preparation for the Indianapolis 500. The track
opens May 15th with qualifications taking place the following
weekend on May 22-23. Final practice will be held on Friday, May
28th with race day coverage of the Indy 500 beginning at noon on
ABC-TV.
Vitor Meira to Start Sixth at Kansas
KANSAS CITY April 30—Vitor Meira posted a four-lap
average speed of 210.67mph to qualify sixth in the ABC Supply
Dallara/Honda for the RoadRunner Turbo Indy 300 at Kansas
Speedway this afternoon. It is his best start in nine events
with A.J. Foyt Racing and the team’s best start since Ryan
Hunter-Reay qualified the No. 14 in seventh place at Toronto
last year.
With regard to oval track qualifying, the team has posted its
best start at this track since 2002 when another Brazilian,
Airton Dare qualified sixth and went on to win the race!
“It’s good to be back where I think the ABC Supply team
belongs,” Meira said afterwards. “This is a substantial
improvement from last year and that’s where we want to be. If we
maintain this pace throughout the season, it’s definitely going
to be a good way to get better every race. We have to build on
what we have now, we have to improve always, but I’m pleased
with today. If every weekend goes like it’s going right now,
we’ll do very good.”
Ryan Briscoe won the pole with a speed of 212.14mph followed by
Scott Dixon (211.29mph), Dario Franchitti (211.23mph), Hideki
Mutoh (211.03mph), Alex Tagliani (210.98mph) and then Meira. Two
drivers’ times were disallowed due to infractions during their
run when they dipped below the white line. They were Dan Wheldon,
who qualified third fastest, and Marco Andretti, who’d qualified
ninth quickest before being disqualified.
Rain early in the day curtailed on-track activities to one
90-minute practice session for the 27 cars entered, including
six rookies. There was only one wall-banging incident when Mario
Romancini lost control and tagged the wall between turns three
and four of the 1.5-mile superspeedway. Qualifying followed an
hour after the late afternoon practice session.
Meira’s record at Kansas Speedway is impressive. He has finished
in the top 10 every time he has finished the race: second in
2004, third in 2005 and 2006 and eighth in 2007. In 2003 and
2008 he was out early with mechanical problems. Last year he was
running strong when Helio Castroneves punted Meira from behind
knocking him out after 14 laps. In 2002, the Foyt team won the
doubleheader at Kansas Speedway with Dare winning the IndyCar
race and A.J. Foyt IV winning the Indy Lights race.
Meira concluded: “It’s been a good weekend thanks to all of the
work the ABC Supply/AJ Foyt Racing team did over the winter and
now with Jeff Britton [chief engineer] helping us out, he’s very
experienced so it’s been a good weekend. I hope it keeps getting
better.”
The fifth race on the IZOD IndyCar Series schedule will be
broadcast live by ABC Sports tomorrow at 1:30pm ET.
NOTES & QUOTES: RoadRunner Turbo Indy 300
• Vitor Meira on the dual intra-series IZOD IndyCar
championships (Road/Street Course Champion and Oval Track
Champion) announced earlier today: “It’s good because some
fans like the oval racing better so they will cheer for their
driver to win the oval track championship and some fans that
watch a lot of Formula 1, they like the road and street courses
better so they would cheer for their driver and team to win that
championship. It also gives the teams more opportunity to show
off their sponsors, sort of like a podium finish. You may not be
top three in the overall championship but you might be in the
road course championship or the oval track championship. It’s
good for the fans, the sponsors and the teams. It brings more to
the mix so I think it’s a good idea.”
• Meira on Kansas: “The key for Kansas, just like any
other oval, is to stay with the lead group and wait for the last
pit stop and then drop the hammer. To do that, we have to unload
with a good setup and I think Jeff [Britton, chief engineer] is
going to be a big part of that. The key is to maintain the lead
group and show what you have for the last 50 laps.”
• On having more downforce at Kansas than last year:
“This is going to play a big part in the race because it’s the
same aero package that they had at Kentucky, so it will be a
very exciting race! With more downforce, which is what this new
package gives you, we can run closer together and the car
doesn’t have to be as perfect in order to have a good race. You
can mask a little bit of mechanical problems with the
aerodynamics. Also with more downforce comes more drag and with
more drag, the draft is better so you can pick up more time
being behind faster cars. The fans are going to have a really
exciting race…and so are we.”
• On large number (6) of rookies at Kansas: “I think it
will change my approach. I’ve been there as a rookie, I know the
mistakes that are going to happen. To be honest, it’s inevitable
with that amount of cars, that amount of rookies, and not only
the rookies but ourselves too! We’ve been off of the ovals quite
a long time, since October for everybody, and for me it’s been
since Indy. There are things that we are going to have to
refresh our minds about and that’s only going to be possible
during the race and sometimes during practice. I think it’ll be
a very busy race with regard to accidents. I hope not. I’ve been
wrong on this before, for example in Long Beach I thought we
were going to have more accidents and we didn’t. But if I had to
predict anything, because of the amount of rookies and the
length of time people have been away from the ovals, I think the
race is going to have more accidents than not.”
• How will you handle it? “In order to protect yourself,
you not only have to be careful, but you have to maintain a
position within the lead pack because the lead pack is going to
have more experienced guys there. The further ahead you are, the
less chance you have of going through an accident. If you’re the
last car, you will, for sure, go through an accident! If you’re
first, only if you cause the accident will you be in it. The
further ahead you are, the less chances you have of getting
involved in something that is not your fault.”
• On A.J. Foyt not being in Kansas this weekend: “It has
two sides but the good side is that he feels comfortable--and
that’s normally not the kind of gamble A.J. would do--but he
feels comfortable with the quality of people that he and Larry
put together on this ABC team. And he’s comfortable enough to go
do something else instead of having to be at the race and I
think ultimately that is his goal. I’m glad he’s able to do that
and go back and forth whenever he feels he’s needed. I think
it’s a good thing.” Foyt will be at the Kentucky Derby this
weekend.
• On His Success at Kansas: “It’s one of those tracks
where I know what to do and what to ask from the car…I really
like the track and maybe it fits what I like from the car. It’s
a track that changes a lot during the race and I was able to
predict what the track and how the car was going to be by the
end of the race so we could prepare for that. You have to
prepare your car for the last 50 laps of the race, not really
the first 50.”
• Meira has finished in the top 10 at Kansas every time
that he finished the race: second in 2004, third in 2005 and
2006 and eighth in 2007. In 2003 and 2008 he was out early with
mechanical problems. Last year he was running strong when Helio
Castroneves punted Meira from behind knocking him out after 14
laps. In 2002, the Foyt team won the doubleheader at Kansas
Speedway with Airton Dare winning the IndyCar race and A.J. Foyt
IV winning the Indy Lights race.
• ABC Supply roofing customer McDowell Roofing of Joplin,
MO won the ‘Your Name Here’ contest for the RoadRunner Turbo
Indy 300. The company name will be atop the sidepods of the No.
14 ABC Supply Dallara/Honda. Claude McDowell will receive
selected merchandise, race tickets, hospitality and garage
passes, plus a Meet and Greet with Vitor Meira. The “Your Name
Here” promotion selected winners by random drawing from a pool
of entries sent in by ABC Supply customers earlier this year.
• The Road Runner Turbo Indy 300 will be shown live at
1:30 p.m. ET Saturday, May 1 on ABC.
• For more information on the Foyt Racing program, please
check our web site: www.ajfoytracing.com. You can also find us
on Twitter and Facebook: search for ajfoytracing.
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