Takagi-Barron Indy 500 Friday Practice

Takagi Wraps Up Practice for the Week at 228.6,

Barron Goes 227.7 in Race Set-Up, Looks to Bump Day

 

INDIANAPOLIS (Friday, May 16, 2003) - Tora Takagi wrapped up his week of practice for next weekend's 87th running of the Indianapolis 500 while Alex Barron continued his preparations for the race with an eye toward Sunday's Bump Day of qualifying in the car formerly driven by the injured Arie Luyendyk.

 

Takagi, who last Sunday qualified his #12 Pioneer/Mo Nunn Racing Toyota-powered Panoz G Force on the inside of the third row, reached a fast lap of 228.657 mph (39.3603 seconds) around the 2.5-mile Indianapolis Motor Speedway four-cornered oval during his 63 laps of work this afternoon.

 

He and teammate Felipe Giaffone, who qualified the #21 Hollywood/Mo Nunn Racing Toyota-powered Panoz G Force on the inside of the sixth row, are done for the week and will return to action during next Thursday's Carburetion Day of final practice.  Giaffone wrapped up his week of preparation yesterday, having clocked the third-fastest laps of the day both Wednesday and Thursday.

 

Barron drove the #20 Meijer/Mo Nunn Racing Toyota-powered Panoz G Force for only the second day since taking over for Luyendyk, who stepped out of the car Wednesday after suffering lingering effects from a practice crash last Friday.  Barron reached 227.714 mph (39.5232 seconds) during his 61 laps of work today.  He'll put in one more day of practice on Saturday before attempting to qualify Sunday.

 

TORA TAKAGI

"This was our best day of work on our race simulation.  I managed to find traffic easier today.  I was having a hard time finding traffic yesterday and Wednesday.  The conditions were very good today, and the car performed very well both on my own and in traffic.  Now we will take the cars back to the shop and get ready for final practice and the race.  I guess I will enjoy some time off.  I will not be coming to the track because it will only make me want to drive more."

 

ALEX BARRON

"I think we're in good shape.  We worked on race setup all day and I think we have the car very well balanced.  I'm able to run flat out pretty comfortably.  Now we're going to put our qualifying motor in the Meijer car tonight and come out looking for as much qualifying speed as we can find tomorrow.  I have an idea how fast I think we can go, but I'm not going to tell you what that is."