It was Fast Friday 2 at IMS, and while not lightening fast, a lot of "work" was accomplished, and three regrettable "adjustments" were made.
(5-14-08, 5:15 p.m.) While things are winding down here in Happy Hour and Buddy Lazier is stuck at 216, I'll recount conversations I had with a couple of drivers today, namely Bruno Junqueira and Buddy Rice. First though, since Martha Meacham is the world's biggest Bruno Junqueira fan, and is invaluable here, Martha, this picture is for you, and Bruno says "hello."

I asked Bruno about the car he has here at Indy and he confirmed that it is a New Dallara. Mario Moraes continues to use the car he has used and misused all season (my words, not Bruno's). Bruno said his car was a "very old" Dallara, a 2003, he crashed it at the Sebring test, got to Homestead and barely tested it, and then it was "very loose" in the Homestead season opener. The original Bruno car is now sitting in the garage as a potential backup for either driver, but they would have to hang a lot of parts on it. Bruno feels that he will have a car he can comfortably run 4 laps above 222-mph with, and believe me, at this point there will be very few 223's tomorrow. Here's the Bruno original...

I mentioned 222's above, and "what's safe tomorrow" was the topic of conversation this morning with Buddy Rice, but not the only one. Contrary to what we may have heard, the car Buddy is in now is NOT the one crashed at Kansas Speedy, the one Buddy was seen "arm-slamming" in frustration after a crash caused by a parts failure. Buddy said "they had written off trying for a good "Q" spot at Kansas to get a good race setup under the car, and he felt they were running well when he went hard into the SAFER." "That car had tub damage, and we just got it back to the shop this week, the team is getting it ready for backup duty," said Rice. I asked Buddy "if he would try to get a fast speed in Saturday to get position over all the rookies at the start of the 500?" "No," he said, "once you are back there it doesn't matter much, we are looking for something between 12th and 18th, it isn't worth the risk of trimming the car out to run 223's, we would be happy with a high-222-mph avg. I was so busy sittin' here tellin' tales I didn't notice that practice ended. What I did notice is that every time I looked out the window, nearly everyone was doing full fuel/long runs and race setups. Of course there is a big difference between a Marco Andretti 221 setup and Sarah Fisher's 208's. Looking at the last chart of the day, Graham Rahal is the best of the yet-to-qualify cars, I've highlighted anyone in the 221's, a speed that will make the field for sure, and at least now we have 7 on the chart where 90 minutes ago there were only a couple.

Pos

Driver

 

Best Time

Best Speed

Best Lap

 

 

Last Lap

1

Scott Dixon (9)

 

40.2301

223.713

32

 

 

80

2

Helio Castroneves (3T)

 

40.2845

223.411

23

 

 

103

3

Ryan Briscoe (6T)

 

40.2916

223.372

40

 

 

86

4

Will Power (8)

 

40.3516

223.039

8

 

 

12

5

Graham Rahal (06)

 

40.3661

222.959

58

 

 

59

6

John Andretti (24)

 

40.3841

222.860

17

 

 

21

7

Marco Andretti (26)

 

40.4015

222.764

116

 

 

126

8

Dan Wheldon (10)

 

40.4168

222.680

29

 

 

56

9

Oriol Servia (5)

 

40.4575

222.456

8

 

 

94

10

Danica Patrick (7)

 

40.4699

222.388

39

 

 

64

11

Bruno Junqueira (18)

 

40.5219

222.102

30

 

 

33

12

Buddy Rice (15)

 

40.5554

221.919

44

 

 

49

13

Townsend Bell (99)

 

40.5667

221.857

85

 

 

86

14

Tony Kanaan (11)

 

40.6079

221.632

57

 

 

80

15

Alex Lloyd (16)

 

40.6251

221.538

36

 

 

37

16

Mario Moraes (19)

 

40.6366

221.475

54

 

 

60

17

Sarah Fisher (67)

 

40.7155

221.046

53

 

 

63

18

Hideki Mutoh (27)

 

40.7465

220.878

55

 

 

69

19

Vitor Meira (4T)

 

40.7690

220.756

41

 

 

118

20

Ed Carpenter (20)

 

40.7746

220.726

50

 

 

76

21

Darren Manning (14)

 

40.8533

220.300

28

 

 

28

22

Enrique Bernoldi (36)

 

40.8539

220.297

49

 

 

51

23

Davey Hamilton (22)

 

40.8645

220.240

55

 

 

64

24

Jeff Simmons (41)

 

40.8885

220.111

15

 

 

15

25

Tomas Scheckter (12)

 

40.9079

220.006

10

 

 

77

26

Max Papis (44)

 

40.9168

219.959

92

 

 

92

27

A.J. Foyt IV (2)

 

40.9261

219.909

29

 

 

41

28

Milka Duno (23)

 

40.9290

219.893

52

 

 

60

29

Justin Wilson (02)

 

40.9444

219.810

18

 

 

62

30

Roger Yasukawa (98)