Dale Coyne Racing with HMD Motorsports David Malukas in the No.18 Honda will start Sunday’s Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach from 19th place, his best start to date on a street course.
Speaking following the action he said:
The Long Beach track is just amazing. From the first sector to the last sector, it’s such a beauty. And I love the hairpin. Qualifying didn’t go as well as we wanted to. The practices weren’t representative of our speed because it was hard to get a clean lap in so we knew the speed was there and we were aiming for a top 10. When we went into qualifying, we did really well on the black tires in the first part of the session but when we switched to the reds we expected them to peak on a certain lap but they didn’t and I think we missed it by one lap and that cost us the two tenths that we really needed to put us in the top six and onto the next round. Overall, I’m still happy. I think our tire strategy going into the race is good. We’ll try to survive, save the tires and see what we can do.”
Takuma Sato in the No.51 Nurtec ODT Honda starts the race from 23rd place and speaking following the action he commented saying:
We tried to find a good balance and speed all through the practice sessions but unfortunately we struggled a bit. Our tire pressure wasn’t ideal for qualifying but I’m confident that we will have a good warm up tomorrow and then make our way through the field to have a good race on Sunday. We did it in St. Petersburg and I know we can do it here.”