Graham Rahal received a text message from a Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing member following news that a team transporter on the way to St. Petersburg, Fla., for the season-opening Verizon IndyCar Series race caught on fire March 24.
“ ‘What do we have to do to change our luck?’ ” said Rahal, referring to the note.
Drivers Phil Davis and Paul Sheehan discovered the fire while on I-65 in Louisville, Ky., about two hours after leaving the race shop in Brownsburg, Ind. It is believed that the fire originated in the engineering lounge, where the damage was restricted. No one was injured.
The No. 15 National Guard car and most of the equipment was not damaged thanks to the efforts of Davis and Sheehan as well as the Zoneton Fire Protection team, which responded within a few minutes. The transporter returned to the race shop and the equipment was transferred to another transporter.
“It's literally like somebody doesn't like us,” Rahal added. “Hopefully this is the last bit of bad luck we'll have this year.”
That certainly would be welcome. Rahal, who won his first Indy car race at St. Petersburg in 2008 and earned the pole in 2009, enters his second season driving for the team co-owned by his father Bob. He finished 18th in the 2013 championship standings, recording two top-five finishes (best of second at Long Beach) in the 19 races.
“Everybody feels a lot of pressure I would say as a team,” he said. “Obviously, compared to last year, it wouldn't be hard to do a better job, but certainly to be more competitive and run up front.
“In my trophy room in my house it's all second-place trophies. I've had opportunity to win from time to time; unfortunately it didn't just come together. This year we need to focus on doing all those things. I think what we really have to work on is we have to qualify better. We race very well, but when you're qualifying 14th, 15th on some of these street courses, it's hard to make up that gap.”
Rahal had an average starting position of 17.7 last season, with a best qualifying effort of eighth at Sonoma Raceway.
“I think we have a good opportunity this year,” he added. “I feel with National Guard it helps take our team to a whole new level. Of course, with (engineers) Bill Papis, John Dick, all the guys we brought on board, that's going to help a lot. But there's always more work to be done. We're going to see this weekend where we stand.”