2009 Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing // Press Release

Sunday, July 26, 2009
Rexall Edmonton Indy
Round 11 of 17 in the IndyCar Series

McDONALD’S DRIVER RAHAL FINISHED SEVENTH IN THE REXALL EDMONTON INDY;
DOORNBOS NINTH

McDonald’s driver Graham Rahal started fifth in the 95-lap Rexall Edmonton Indy on the 1.973-mile airport road course but took a conservative approach on the start rather than be hit on the opening lap for the second straight race this season and dropped to eighth but regained one spot a few turns later and finished seventh. On the start, Mario Moraes, who hit him on Lap 1 of the Edmonton race last year pulled on the inside heading down the front straight into the first turn while Dario Franchitti and Paul Tracy took advantage of the situation and also pulled ahead of Rahal on the outside and dropped him momentarily to eighth place. A few turns later Moraes and teammate Tracy made contact and Moraes retired from the event which moved Rahal into seventh. He held his position through the stint and was able to stretch his fuel one-to-two laps longer than the majority of the field and pitted on Lap 34. He returned to the track in seventh place and held his position until the next round of stops began and came in earlier than planned as he was being held up behind the lapped car of Hideki Mutoh so the team called him in on Lap 61. He returned to the track in ninth place but regained seventh after the pit cycle was compete on Lap 69. A few laps later he closed on the slower lapped car of Wheldon, who was repeatedly shown the blue “move over” flag. Once he was finally past him he caught up to the lapped car of Alex Tagliani. Both of these backmarkers enabled eighth place Justin Wilson to close his deficit to Rahal from 18 seconds to three but Rahal was able to maintain seventh by the time the only full course caution of the day came out for Tomas Scheckter with two laps to go. Pole sitter Will Power won the event while Helio Castroneves and Scott Dixon finished second and third respectively. He maintained his 10th place rank in the standings with a total of 235 points, 50 behind fifth place Danica Patrick. Following are Rahal’s post race comments:

“At the start I saw Moraes coming and I said ‘Forget it, I’m just going to let him go around rather than get hit.’ He and his teammate collected each other anyway so that helped. I really just wanted to make it through the first lap so I thought losing a position or two was better than getting taken out again. I saw Moraes really early, pulling to the inside, and he wasn’t on me but I didn’t want to see last year happen again. Then after that I was just conserving fuel and I felt like we were one of the guys that went the longest. And then we pitted a little bit early on the second stop to try and get out from behind Wheldon. Then we put the black’s on at the end and the car felt diabolical for the first 15 or 20 laps. We started to get it cured a little bit by using my bars and with the tires wearing it helped out a little bit but I just never quite had the pace that I did on the reds. I wish I had the reds there at the end to try and challenge PT (Paul Tracy) because he didn’t look too strong at the end either. We brought the McDonald’s car home but we were really hoping to finish a little higher.”

Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing driver Robert Doornbos gained two positions on the start to move from 10th to eight on the opening lap of today’s 95-lap Rexall Edmonton Indy and ultimately finished ninth in a race that surprisingly saw only one full course caution on the final two laps. On the start, he moved passed Mario Moraes, who retired after Lap 1 contact with his teammate Paul Tracy, and eighth place starter Rafael Matos. He held eighth place through the first pit stop on Lap 34 and until the next round of stops began on Lap 61 before he made his second stop on Lap 66 after stretching his fuel. After the stops were complete he moved up to ninth place and lost one spot to Justin Wilson who stayed on track three laps longer and gained a position. On Lap 82, race leader Will Power passed him and Doornbos went one lap down. With two laps to go, Tomas Scheckter brought out the only full course caution period of the race when he made contact and the field took the checkered flag under caution. Doornbos’ ninth place finish enabled him to regain the lead in the Rookie of the Year standings from Matos who finished 18th by a three point margin (197-194) and he moved from 14th to 12th in the standings. Pole sitter Will Power won the event while Helio Castroneves and Scott Dixon finished second and third respectively. Following are Doornbos’ post race comments.

“We had a good start. Coming out of the chicane I had good momentum building up and I was in the middle of a sandwich between PT and Matos, I think, and I managed to outbreak two cars so that was good and I just slotted in line and had a good first lap. So I was following Graham and saving fuel and trying to think of some strategy, hoping for some yellows but nothing happened so we just started running on higher fuel maps and pushing to try to keep the position. We had a good first stint and we were pushing with both cars and at the pit stop everything went well and I got out I got held up a bit and that’s when I lost track position with the train of cars in front of me. There wasn’t much action going on because there was no one for me to race nearby. It was fun, it was a hard race for P9 but we brought both cars back home in the top-10 which is good for now. We’ll just work harder to close the gap to the top teams. Near the end I had to let Power by but it was good to see the Penske pace and to see that we could follow them and drive the same lap times and that was quite positive.”

The series will return to a 1.5-mile oval for the first time since Rahal and Doornbos qualified first and second, respectively, at Kansas Speedway in April. The Meijer Indy 300 at Kentucky Speedway will take place on Saturday, August 1 at 8:45 PM.