Elkhart Lake, WI (June 26, 2016) – Dale Coyne Racing was on its way to a third Top-10 finish in a row with less than 11 laps remaining at the KOHLER Grand Prix at Road America on Sunday, but it was not meant to be as Conor Daly’s race ended in Turn 1 with a left rear suspension failure and Gabby Chaves saw his race get ruined by two pit lane speed violations.
Daly, who ran in the top six with the likes of Helio Castroneves and Ryan Hunter-Reay for the majority of the race, suffered a left rear suspension failure on his #18 Jonathan Byrd’s Hospitality machine. The failure sent him spinning into the Turn 1 runoff area, putting an end to his race in 21st place.
Chaves was on his way to a possible top 12 finish thanks to an alternate pit stop strategy. However, the Colombian got penalized entering pit lane for going over the speed limit on his third stop and received a drive through penalty. Unfortunately, it appears an electrical issue with the pit lane speed limiter was the cause because while serving his penalty, Chaves once again went over the speed limit and received another drive through penalty.
Having lost a lap and half to the rest of the field, the driver of the #19 Boy Scouts of America car lost all chances of making up positions and went on to finish 19th.
The team will now head back to their Chicago-based shop as they prepare for the Iowa Corn 300, which takes place July 10, 2016 at Iowa Speedway.
What they have to say:
Gabby Chaves – #19 Boy Scouts of America
“First of all I want to thank all the fans for coming out. It’s great to see so many people here. It’s one of my favorite tracks and hopefully we get to come back year after year. As for our race, I think I could’ve maybe saved a Top-12 finish but unfortunately it looked like we had some sort of electrical issue with our pit lane speed limiter and we were just getting pit lane speed violations every time we came in the pits, which is weird because it was fine in practice. I made sure every time we were at the line that we were where we needed to be and we got two in a row, so I guess these things happen. I just had to do it manually at the end. It hurt us though because we lost a lap and a half.”
Conor Daly – #18 Jonathan Byrd’s Hospitality
“It just went so fast, it felt like I got clipped by Ryan (Hunter-Reay) but clearly that wasn’t the case. After looking at the car, we now know that there was a left rear suspension failure. I never had something like that happen before. Other than that, it was nice to be consistently running up front and trying to chase down the Penske cars. It’s a tough race for sure but the team gave me a good car that I could race with so that was nice. I guess these things happen, we just have to move on. Finally, I also want to say how awesome it is to be racing here at Road America, and seeing all the fans that came out. What a great event. I hope we come back next year!”
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