De Silvestro Muscles Through Qualifying

TORONTO, July 18, 2010: After having had 3 practice sessions under her belt, Simona De Silvestro and her Team Stargate Worlds crew prepared to qualify for tomorrow’s Honda Indy Toronto race. With temperatures in the high 80’s and the threat of thunderstorms today and tomorrow looming, the field of 26 IndyCar racers were all looking for a good qualifying effort to put them in a good position for tomorrow’s race, should rain be a factor.

For the first practice session, held yesterday, Simona finished 20th after running 15 laps with a best lap time of 01:05.9338. The 2nd and 3rd practice sessions ended with Simona finishing in the 23rd and 22nd spots respectively. In total she ran 64 trouble-free practice laps.

Being part of the first qualifying group, Simona and team spared little time getting on track for her qualifying effort. Running between the 10th and 12th spots on the timesheet, she spent most of her on-track time trying to muscle the 1600 pound Honda/Dallara Indy Car around the 1.75-mile temporary street course. At the completion of the 15-minute session Simona finished 11th with a time of 1:02:0547. By the end of the full qualifying session Simona’s final position was 21st. The crew will take the No. 78 Stargate Resistance entry back to the garage and prepare it for tomorrow’s race.

Tomorrow’s Honda Indy Toronto, at Toronto, Ontario, CA will be broadcast live at 12:30 pm EST on ABC television. Additional coverage is available at www.indycar.com for live timing and video, while radio coverage will be provided by the IMS Networks and Sirius Channel 221 and XM channel 145.

Simona De Silvestro, Driver No. 78: “This was not what we had expected. We had been struggling during the practice sessions and did improve during qualifying. I’m sure our performance tomorrow will be better and it’s going to be a long race so it’s going to be about patience and skill and we are hoping to be able to get a great result tomorrow.”

Keith Wiggins, HVM Racing Team Principal: “We've struggled to get the car to Simona's liking throughout the practice sessions, with some improvements made in qualifying. Here is one of the few places where being a single car and rookie has made it tough to identify what we need. However, I am sure we can come back tomorrow if we stay out of trouble.”

Imran Safiulla, Team Stargate Worlds Team Principal: "Not the day we were hoping to have. We found ourselves chasing the car around a bit and just were not able to bring it all together for qualifying. We do believe we made some forward progress during qualifying, but not enough. We will hope to be better tomorrow and get the car to the end of the race."