RYAN BRISCOE (No. 6 Team Penske): “It’s nice to be at the top of the speed charts. It’s important because it is our only test before the first race, so we’re all comparing times. It’s nice to have the Team Penske cars on top. It’s a great way to start the year.”
HELIO CASTRONEVES (No. 3 Team Penske): “Today was about getting a rhythm. The last time I was in a Team Penske car on a road course was Infineon (last August). You need testing to get your muscles back into shape. Even if you’ve been working out, you still need to get your rhythm back and get to work. That was the goal today. Tomorrow we’ll work on the small details.”
JUSTIN WILSON (No. 22 Dreyer & Reinbold Racing): “The first day in the car was really good. It was a pretty positive day and we kept making improvements. All in all, I think that it went well and I’m pleased with P3. I’m getting comfortable in the car and with my new engineer and crew. I’m looking forward to tomorrow. Unfortunately, at the end of the day I just clipped the grass going into Turn 1 and the car snapped around on me. The car isn’t too badly damaged and I’m OK.”
WILL POWER (No. 12 Verizon Team Penske): “It felt great to be back in the car. This has been the longest offseason of my career. We were able to learn a few things today. The No. 12 Verizon Team Penske car ran great today. The team worked together nicely and we had a productive day. I am looking forward to getting back on track tomorrow.”
SCOTT DIXON (No. 9 Target Chip Ganassi Racing): “We worked on a combination on aero and mechanical items today. There’s still a lot more work to be done tomorrow so I hope it’s going to be a bit warmer for us.”
E.J. VISO (No. 8 KV Racing Technology): “It was a pretty good day for the whole KV Racing Technology team. It was the first time we had three cars on track and I think it was a successful day. I am very happy to be part of this team. With the little time that I have had with them, the KVRT crew guys have done a great job and I think we showed the hunger make this a very positive year for KV Racing Technology.”
TAKUMA SATO (No. 5 KV Racing Technology): “It was a great day. The KV Racing Technology car was reliable and once I had got used to the way an Indy car handles and how the track layout was I enjoyed it. The track is superb, a lot of fast corners and elevation. The day started off slowly, with cold temperatures and difficult conditions, but by the end we had a very successful first test. We went through some setups which helped me to learn a lot and had a very productive first day.”
TONY KANAAN (No. 11 Andretti Autosport): “It was a lot better than I expected. It was good to be back in the Team 7-Eleven car. It’s a tough track, actually, and it takes you a while to learn it. I think it was a productive day for us. We made huge improvements on the car from the start of the practice to the end. Hopefully, the weather will be a little bit better tomorrow. It’s our last practice day before the first race of the season, so we need to take advantage of it.”
DARIO FRANCHITTI (No. 10 Target Chip Ganassi Racing): “We went through a list of test items today that we’ve been working on in the offseason. The weather has changed things slightly. Overall, we learned some things not to do. Hopefully, we’ll just keep working our way through our list of items tomorrow.”
HIDEKI MUTOH (No. 06 Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing): “The last time I drove an Indy car was at Sebring in November with this team for a one-day test, so it has been three months since I was in a race car. It took a while to get up to speed but once I got there the car felt really good. By the end of the day, I was starting to have good communication with my engineer Martin (Pare), who I knew when we were both at Andretti Green Racing. It takes time because of my (English) and also I need to understand what they are talking about, but so far, I am very happy. I feel the car has a lot of potential to do a good lap time. I like the course. There are a lot of elevation changes and nice, fast corners, quick Esses and also some slow corners. It’s very fun and challenging to drive.”
MARCO ANDRETTI (No. 26 Andretti Autosport): “If anything today, we were able to make the 26 car different. It started to feel more like a race car and we got some normal qualities back that we’ve been looking for. I’m a little disappointed with our time, but we’re heading in the right direction. I think we’ll see good results from the Venom car if we stick to our plan.”
MARIO ROMANCINI (No. 34 Conquest Racing): “I am very happy with our first day of testing with the team. We had a productive session and we used well our track time. It’s good to see that we are within one second of the best time for our very first day. I adapted to the car very easily. Tomorrow we will start to test different things versus today where the team focused on giving me as much seat time as possible.”
JAMES ROSSITER (No. 32 KV Racing Technology): “It felt good for my first experience with KV Racing Technology and driving an Indy car. I have lots to learn and lots to think about tonight and I am sure we will come back stronger tomorrow. I certainly have a lot of information to take onboard and digest and will work with the engineers tonight and hopefully have a more productive day tomorrow.”
VITOR MEIRA (No. 14 A.J. Foyt Racing): “We accomplished what we came to do which was to establish a baseline today working with Jeff (Britton, chief engineer). It’s been over 10 months since I was on a road course and as you can see it’s taken its toll. I’m still getting myself in the game. I didn’t push it as much as I normally would—I never even put a wheel off today. But today was more about gathering data to know where we are at so we can move forward tomorrow. It was a good day for the ABC Supply team.”
RAPHAEL MATOS (No. 2 Luczo Dragon Racing): “It was a difficult day for us. We were working on the balance of the car all day, but were never able to find a good balance. The good thing is we know the direction we are going to take, we’ll make a few changes to the car and hopefully will be much better tomorrow. It has been helpful being around Gil. I think we are understanding each other better and better every time and that will help communicating about the car with the engineers. Now we will try to make the necessary changes and hopefully that will translate in performance.
RYAN HUNTER-REAY (No. 37 Andretti Autosport): “It was a bit of a strange day, but an expected day for Team IZOD. We had to get some things sorted out for my liking and we went back to the transporter a number of times to do that. They were lengthy changes, but we got it sorted to where we could run for about two hours.” (About the track): “Barber, like Sonoma, is a place where you have to know your way around to get a good time around it. It has a lot of blind entries and exits, so I needed to learn the track. I took my time with that and we took our time getting the settings right on the car. By the end of the day, I was finally able to start to push. Hopefully, it’s not too cold tomorrow and we’ll get some better track time.”
MIKE CONWAY (No. 24 Dreyer & Reinbold Racing): “Today was a tough day and we were just trying to get a good balance with the car, but struggled a little bit. Tomorrow we are just going to keep up the hard work and try and get through all of the test items. Luckily, we were able to get some laps in and hopefully we can do the same tomorrow.”
DANICA PATRICK (No. 7 Andretti Autosport): “Today’s test was definitely a challenge. The GoDaddy car wasn’t handling the way that I would’ve liked; the cold weather doesn’t help either. So tonight we’re going to take a look at the data and see what we can learn from it. Hopefully tomorrow’s session will go better.”
SARAH FISHER: (No. 67 Sarah Fisher Racing): “Not necessarily my most fantastic day, but we did learn a lot. The fastest lap we had was the last one, which just shows there’s a lot more to learn tomorrow. We fought the weather all day, temperatures weren’t on our side for grip right off the bat, all in all - I’m more comfortable in the car which will help allow me to learn these techniques quicker. With the smaller window of experience there’s a lot to be learned in a short amount of time. The plan tomorrow is for Jay to be in the car in the morning, learn from him with his time on track - leading up to me in the car again in the afternoon.”
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