Rahal Letterman Lanigan RacingHonda Indy Toronto – Streets Around Exhibition Place
Pre-Race Notes
Round 10 of 17 in the 2022 NTT INDYCAR SERIES

DATE:     July 15-17, 2022

PRACTICE BROADCAST:     Live on Peacock Premium on Friday from 2:30 – 3:45 p.m. ET, on Saturday from 10:00 – 11:00 a.m. and Sunday from 10:55 – 11:25 a.m. ET.  Also live on the INDYCAR Radio Network (IRN) and www.indycar.com (timing & scoring + live analysis).

QUALIFYING BROADCAST:     Live on Peacock Premium, the IRN and www.indycar.com (timing & scoring + live analysis) from 2:00 – 3:15 p.m. ET Saturday.

RACE BROADCAST:     Live on Peacock on Sunday, July 17 from 3:00 – 6:00 p.m. ET. And also, on Peacock Premium, IRN, Sirius 211 and XM 205

TRACK LAYOUT:     1.786-mile, 11-turn temporary street course
RACE LENGTH:     85 laps / 151.81 miles

2019 WINNER:     Simon Pagenaud
2019 POLESITTER:     Simon Pagenaud (110.041 mph)

RAHAL’S BEST TORONTO START / FINISH:     2nd in 2017 / 5th in 2010; will be his 15th Indy car race here and 16th overall
RAHAL’S HIGHEST SERIES START / FINISH:     3 Poles – St. Pete (street) 2009, Kansas (oval) 2009, Detroit (street) 2017 / 6 Wins – St. Pete 2008, Fontana (oval; 500 miles) 2015, Mid-Ohio (road) 2015, Texas (oval) 2016; Detroit Race 1 2017, Detroit Race 2 2017

LUNDGAARD’S BEST START / FINISH AT TORONTO:     First race here
LUNDGAARD’S BEST SERIES START / FINISH:     4^th – ’21 Indy GP, Race 2 / 9^th – ’22 Indy GP

HARVEY’S BEST START / FINISH AT TORONTO:     First INDYCAR SERIES race here; competed in three Indy Lights races in 2014-2015
HARVEY’S HIGHEST SERIES START / FINISH:     2nd – Indy GP & Road America (2020), St. Pete 2021 / 3rd at the Indy GP (2019)

RLL’S BEST START / FINISH AT TORONTO:     Pole 1992 (B. Rahal) / 2nd (B. Rahal 1992, 1994, 1995; Jourdain Jr. 2003)


NEWS & NOTES:

FIVE PODIUMS AND ONE POLE IN TORONTO FOR RLL
The 2022 Honda Indy Toronto will mark the 21st year of Indy car racing for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing (RLL) here and first since 2019 due to the pandemic. The team also competed in the Atlantic Series races here in 2003 and 2004.  The team earned a total of four second place finishes (Rahal 1992, 1994, 1995; Michel Jourdain Jr. 2003) and best start was pole in 1992 by Bobby Rahal.  Prior to the 2022 event, the team prepared a total of 35 Indy car entries for drivers Bobby Rahal (1992-98), Mike Groff (1994), Raul Boesel (1995), Bryan Herta (1996-99), Max Papis (1999-2001), Jimmy Vasser (2002), Michel Jourdain Jr. (2002-03), Takuma Sato (2012, 2018-19), Graham Rahal (2013 x 2; 2014 x2; 2015-2019), James Jakes (2013 x 2) and Luca Filippi (2014 x2). RLL also prepared three Toyota Atlantic entries (Danica Patrick 2003-2004; Chris Festa 2004).  In total, the team has earned FIVE podiums (3rd – Rahal 1996), 9 top-five’s and 20 top-10 finishes at the track.  The No. 15 United Rentals entry for Graham Rahal, the No. 30 HUB International entry and No. 45 Hy-Vee entry for Jack Harvey will bring the Indy car total to 38 in 2022.

GRAHAM RAHAL AT TORONTO
The 2022 Honda Indy Toronto will be Graham Rahal’s 15th Indy car race here and 16th overall (Atlantic 2006).  In 14 Indy car races, his best start of second came in 2017 with RLL and best finish of fifth came in 2010 with Newman/Haas Racing. He has three, top-five starts and five, top-10 finishes. He is looking forward to getting on track around Toronto’s Exhibition Place again.
            “I’m very excited to go back to Toronto; it’s a great track, a great city that a lot of us have missed over the last couple of years. I know it’s going to be a challenging track this year, just because of the lack of knowledge of what’s changed since 2019. It’s going to be critical for us to get an understanding about the track and what has changed once we arrive, see how it may have degraded, seeing if new patches are on the surface or other changes that will impact our car setup. After testing at Sebring, I feel like we’ve got some new things to try with the setup. I’m eager to get out there, I’m eager to get on track and try to get some positive results as we go into the second half of the season. Fingers crossed for a great one.
            “I feel like after our Sebring test, that we’ve gotten a lot of good stuff to try so I’m eager to get out there and put on as good of a show as we can. A lot of our partners like United Rentals, HUB, Rousseau and more are there. United Rentals has been such a legendary partner of our team for so many years and it would be nice to get them a good result in Toronto and it would be great to get a Rahal back on the stop step in Toronto, with my dad winning the first in 1986. It would be good to make it happen again. It’s great to see HUB as the primary sponsor of Christian’s car. That relationship started through clients of my performance facility and it has grown into a great one. Our families are close friends and now seeing them on the side of Christian’s car will be cool.”

CHRISTIAN AND TORONTO
Lundgaard will make his debut on the streets of Toronto in the HUB International Honda. After recently testing on the bumpy road course in Sebring, the team hopes to turn knowledge gained there into performance gains in Toronto.  
            “I’m looking forward to the race in Toronto. It’s the only event outside the United States so its special. I’ve never been to Toronto so I’m going there early and staying for a couple of days after to have a look at the city. I’m looking forward to the weekend itself. Our test at Sebring went quite well and I think we learned a lot and confirmed a lot of our theories and etc. I’m looking forward to seeing if we can extract anything from that on track, to see if we can get a benefit from it and confirm one of our theories from Detroit and the other street circuits we’ve driven at this year. I think it’s a great opportunity for HUB and I to come together in Toronto. It’s a good place for both parties as its one of the events I have looked forward to and they have a big presence in Canada. We’re going to make the most of it in Toronto.”

JACK WILL MAKE HIS INDYCAR DEBUT AT TORONTO AFTER 3 FOR 3 LIGHTS PODIUMS
The 2022 Honda Indy Toronto will mark Jack Harvey’s first time to compete in the INDYCAR SERIES race here. He competed here in 2014 in Indy Lights where he started fourth and finished third. And also competed in the doubleheader here in 2015 where he started fourth in Race 1 and fifth in Race 2 and finished second in both, He is looking forward to his return.
“I’m really excited to go back to Toronto. It’s a track that I always really enjoyed driving and I just really love the city. There are so many positive feelings about heading back to Toronto. It’s been a few years since the series has been there. The track itself is slightly different from when I last raced there in 2015 but actually up until this point, I’ve never finished off the podium so I’m hopeful that we can have a really good weekend. As a team, we had a test in Sebring recently which we’re hoping directly translates to Toronto. That very much was a street circuit test for us. I feel like we left there optimistic with some of the things that we found and our understanding of the car.
            “At this point I don’t see any reason why we can’t have a good weekend. I think that we as a team need to remember is to have fun and for me to go out there and drive to the limit of the car, don’t drive over the limit of the car and just chip away at it. It’s important to try and not be frustrated. At the end of the day, we‘re going to pull ourselves up and everyone has to play their part to do that. I think the weekend off was well-deserved. It seems to have been productive and the atmosphere at the team is already very good. I’m hopeful that with everything we have been learning, and have learned, coupled with having had a nice weekend off to reset and recharge, we go to Toronto and have a really good weekend.”

POINTS BATTLE AFTER 9 OF 17 RACES
Heading into Round 10 of 17 at the Honda Indy Toronto, Rahal has a total of 177 points and is ranked 15th overall. Lundgaard is ranked 17th with 159 and is the highest-ranked rookie and Harvey is 20th with 115.