Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing drivers Graham Rahal, Christian Lundgaard, and Jack Harvey head into this weekend’s Big Machine Music City Grand Prix on Nashville streets, aiming for a solid weekend.
Graham Rahal in the No.15 Fifth Third Bank Honda will be looking to continue his strong form at Nashville having finished fifth here last season and looking ahead to the race this weekend he said:
“I think we’ve found speed. I think Toronto was a good culmination of opportunities for Christian and myself. I don’t think we were the fastest cars on that given weekend but obviously everything in the race went well for Christian so I hope there are things that we can gain and learn from that, that we can take to Nashville. I think we still have significant performance to find on street courses but hopefully we can carry some of the things over from Toronto. Last year in Nashville, we were decently competitive so hopefully it will work out. The Nashville race is just so unbelievably unpredictable; that’s what’s hard about it. It’s very difficult to have a smooth race as I learned last year with two accidents. It’s difficult to stay out of trouble; the back section of the track is so tight. It’s a wildcard of a race and I expect it to be crazy and interesting once again. Nashville is a huge market and it appears it’s going to be our season finale going forward. It’s a market INDYCAR racing must be in and it’s a huge opportunity for us as a sport so I hope we can keep building upon it.”
Jack Harvey in the No.30 Kustom Entertainment Honda is looking forward to the race this weekend having scored a ninth-place finish here last season and speaking about the race this weekend he said:
“I’m looking forward to Nashville, it’s one of my favorite race events we go to. I absolutely love the city. Last year we had a pretty decent race amidst all of the chaos, which has been a bit of a theme there. Heading into the weekend, we’re just looking for a clean, smooth one. If we can execute those things, I definitely feel like we can go and be competitive and think our street course car has been quite good. Without the Toronto Lap 1 incident, I think we would have had a pretty great race there as well. I’m quite optimistic heading into the weekend but a smooth and sensible one is the best path we should take right now.”
Christian Lundgaard in the No.45 Hy-Vee Honda is looking forward to to race in Nashville this weekend saying:
“Nashville is definitely going to be one of more fun weekends of the year. We were competitive there last year and obviously coming off a win in Toronto, the previous street circuit, I think we can walk in with expectations to do well. We knew that Iowa (short oval) was going to be a struggle for us but we were obviously hoping for more with the momentum boost we were carrying. I’m obviously expecting to have a good result and carry the momentum forward for the rest of the championshjp. We’ve just got to execute. I think we’ll have a good package in Nashville, and we know we’ll have a good package at the Brickyard GP the following weekend and I’m obviously looking forward to that one. Overall, I’m pretty excited for the races in this last stretch of the season and will try to see if we can put the Hy-Vee team back on the top spot of the podium.”