Practice day #3 for the 102nd Indy 500

By Tony DiZinno of Trackside Online…

It’s a pair of veterans who topped Thursday’s seven-hour practice, with 29-year-old Graham Rahal going into his 11th Indianapolis 500 and 43-year-old Tony Kanaan going into his 17th ‘500 atop the timesheets.

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Rahal, 34th on Wednesday, felt it important to “put down a lap” early and eliminate any chatter that he and the United Rentals Honda for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing had lost a step.

Rahal ordinarily isn’t into putting down a big lap, but wound up doing so. Planning to run a qualifying simulation, he came out behind Stefan Wilson’s car. Rather than back out, Rahal laid down his best speed of 226.047 mph on his second lap, which held as the fastest lap of the day.

“It’s not normally my M.O. But I thought, ‘Let’s get a good one in and lower my dad’s blood pressure for the night,’” Rahal laughed.

He did not complete a qualifying simulation or a proper no-tow lap all day, which explained why he ranked lower on those charts today (34th at 219.368 mph).

Like others, Rahal has noted running in traffic with the new Dallara UAK18 at the IMS oval is difficult from third on back.

“First and second is awesome, but anything beyond that is tough. If you do get a tow, it is massive,” he said.

When he saw JR Hildebrand’s incident late in the day on Thursday, he thought it could have been him given how many times he felt the aero wash running that far back.

Rahal also said at this track, the car’s reduced downforce and drag isn’t fully there.

“This is the only package…that it is draggier than the Honda package last year,” he said.

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In “TK’s” case, it was nice to be back in the media room after the day.

“I’m used to being here; the Foyt team hasn’t been for a while, so it’s my job to keep Anne (Fornoro, longtime Foyt P.R. representative) and I coming back here!” he laughed.

Kanaan said that thanks to a strong unload, it’s been a very productive three days of running thus far.

“It’s been a good week. We unloaded quick. Now it’s just the track playing some mind games. Some days are better, some are worse,” he admitted.

The Foyt team has put together two new superspeedway cars for Kanaan and rookie Matheus Leist, which has meant a lot of long hours of preparation work. Kanaan said they worked on Mother’s Day Sunday until 2 a.m., and then on Monday as well in the Speedway, Ind. shop.

“Everyone’s been a little tired. But that’s the price you pay to win this race,” he said.

Of rookie Leist’s first week so far, Kanaan said, “Matheus has had up and downs as a rookie. I told him this track plays mind games. We’re trying to keep him straight between A.J., Larry and I. It’s funny to watch.”

Kanaan has joined Foyt this year after four seasons at Chip Ganassi Racing, three years at KVSH Racing (or KV Racing Technology, depending on the year) and eight years at Andretti Autosport (or Andretti Green Racing).

He’s pleased with the working dynamic in the two-car Foyt team, which this month expands to three cars with the Foyt with Byrd/Hollinger/Belardi car added.

“That responsibility (of leading the engineering room) was there from day one,” Kanaan said. “They’re trying to lean on us. But they’ve done a good job for us. Matheus (Leist) found some good things at the end of the day. It’s working we like used to work. Yep I’ve got more experience, but we have the normal chemistry like a 3-4 car team.”

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Here’s some notes from the final 90 minutes of the session.

Just before 4:30 p.m. ET, Power improves his best no-tow lap at 223.971 mph, which is quicker than he ran earlier.

With 90 minutes to go, these are the top no-tow speeds:

1-12-Will Power, 223.971
2-18-Sebastien Bourdais, 223.348
3-23-Charlie Kimball, 223.208
4-22-Simon Pagenaud, 223.144
5-27-Alexander Rossi, 222.979

One dicey moment occurs between Rahal and Harvey at Turn 2, as Harvey goes underneath Rahal’s car but lower than normal line through the corner.

With 25 minutes left, the bottom two drivers on the no-tow charts are James Davison in 35th and Jay Howard in 34th. Rahal is fastest with a tow today but ranks 33rd on the no-tow. The Foyt with Byrd/Hollinger/Belardi team posts that Davison is set to begin trimming out to improve his no-tow speed of 218.735 mph. He eventually does improve to a 220.240.

We have yellow for first incident of the month for JR Hildebrand between Turn 3 and 4, with just less than 22 minutes remaining.

Hildebrand hits the wall in Turn 3 with the outside of the No. 66 Salesforce/DRR Chevrolet, and then continues to skate through Turn 4. The car came to a stop with light front wing and right rear suspension damage.

Hildebrand was running eighth in a pack behind James Hinchcliffe, Helio Castroneves, Zach Veach, Stefan Wilson, Simon Pagenaud, Sage Karam and Conor Daly when his car washed up and hit the wall exiting Turn 3.

After climbing from the car under his own power, he’s been checked, cleared and released from the infield medical center.

Green flag is back out with just under 13 minutes remaining and with just under 2,400 laps complete, we should get a frantic final bit of action to end Thursday’s running.

There are nearly 25 cars on track, with most of them in a train, as we head into the final nine minutes.

Checkered flag flies at 6 p.m. ET with Rahal still on top from this morning, and a total of 2,771 laps complete.

Rahal’s no-tow speed was only 34th, 219.368 mph, while his tow speed was 226.047 mph.

The time sheet is below.

P	No	Name	Team	Engine	FSpeed	Laps
1	15	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	Honda	226.047	102
2	14	Tony Kanaan	AJ Foyt Enterprises	Chevy	225.896	62
3	98	Marco Andretti	Andretti Herta Autosport with Curb-Agajanian	Honda	225.584	86
4	20	Ed Carpenter	Ed Carpenter Racing	Chevy	225.093	97
5	24	Sage Karam	Dreyer & Reinbold	Chevy	224.920	72
6	1	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske	Chevy	224.713	75
7	19	Zachary Claman De Melo	Dale Coyne Racing	Honda	224.665	60
8	3	Helio Castroneves	Team Penske	Chevy	224.575	110
9	21	Spencer Pigot	Ed Carpenter Racing	Chevy	224.251	86
10	88	Gabby Chaves	Harding Racing	Chevy	224.180	73
11	22	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske	Chevy	224.158	87
12	9	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing Teams	Honda	223.973	98
13	12	Will Power	Team Penske	Chevy	223.971	90
14	4	Matheus Leist	AJ Foyt Enterprises	Chevy	223.746	59
15	18	Sebastien Bourdais	Dale Coyne Racing with Vasser-Sullivan	Honda	223.691	82
16	64	Oriol Servia	Scuderia Corsa with RLL	Honda	223.641	62
17	7	Jay Howard	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	Honda	223.606	73
18	60	Jack Harvey	Meyer Shank Racing with Schmidt Peterson	Honda	223.556	94
19	10	Ed Jones	Chip Ganassi Racing Teams	Honda	223.379	79
20	66	JR Hildebrand	Dreyer & Reinbold	Chevy	223.351	57
21	23	Charlie Kimball	Carlin	Chevy	223.324	32
22	27	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	Honda	222.979	84
23	29	Carlos Munoz	Andretti Autosport	Honda	222.978	78
24	6	Robert Wickens	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	Honda	222.886	63
25	32	Kyle Kaiser	Juncos Racing	Chevy	222.760	91
26	28	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	Honda	222.716	92
27	59	Max Chilton	Carlin	Chevy	222.667	45
28	25	Stefan Wilson	Andretti Autosport	Honda	222.396	96
29	33	James Davison	Foyt with Byrd/Hollinger/Belardi	Chevy	222.283	81
30	13	Danica Patrick	Ed Carpenter Racing	Chevy	222.216	68
31	5	James Hinchcliffe	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	Honda	222.157	83
32	63	Pippa Mann	Dale Coyne Racing	Honda	222.114	69
33	30	Takuma Sato	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	Honda	221.776	89
34	17	Conor Daly	Dale Coyne Racing dba Thom Burns Racing	Honda	221.583	89
35	26	Zach Veach	Andretti Autosport	Honda	221.343	106