Phoenix, AZ (April 28, 2017) – Dale Coyne Racing driver Sebastien Bourdais scored his best qualifying position of the season at Phoenix International Raceway on Friday night with a 10th place on the grid for Saturday’s race, while rookie Ed Jones impressed in his first Verizon IndyCar Series oval qualifying session by placing 16th ahead of five more experienced drivers.
After a very windy practice session late in the afternoon, drivers were faced with cooler temperatures and less windy conditions entering the qualifying session for the Desert Diamond West Valley Phoenix Grand Prix.
Jones and Bourdais were 19th and 20th, respectively, in the qualifying order. Dale Coyne Racing’s rookie, put in a combined time of 38.7226 seconds for his two qualifying laps. His average speed of 190.029 mph was good to initially place him 14th. However, with two more cars left to qualify, he would end up 16th on the grid.
One of those cars was his teammate, Bourdais, who registered a total time of 38.4554 seconds and an average speed of 191.349 which would end up placing him 10th in the 21-car field.
The Desert Diamond West Valley Phoenix Grand Prix will be broadcast live on NBCSN at 9:00pm ET on April 29.
Sebastien Bourdais – #18 Sonny’s BBQ Honda
“Not a bad run in the Sonny’s car, but just not quite good enough. We’re kind of fighting amongst ourselves in the Honda camp, and we’re P5 in that group. It’s OK, it’s not great, but at the end of the day it’s a tough run. You have to go straight out and all of a sudden you have to pull that lap and get your timing right. I wasn’t quite aggressive enough and I didn’t quite get the car spooled up enough on lap 1. We’ll keep pushing and see where we end up tomorrow.”
Ed Jones – #19 Boy Scouts of America Honda
“The Boy Scouts car was pretty good. Obviously, the conditions were much different to practice, a lot cooler and a bit less wind. It was so much cooler that I wasn’t quite confident on the first lap and I had a little bit of push and I struggled a bit with understeer but otherwise it was decent. I think we have a better car than where we qualified, so I feel confident we can move forward tomorrow.”
Phoenix, AZ (April 28, 2017) – Dale Coyne Racing driver Sebastien Bourdais scored his best qualifying position of the season at Phoenix International Raceway on Friday night with a 10th place on the grid for Saturday’s race, while rookie Ed Jones impressed in his first Verizon IndyCar Series oval qualifying session by placing 16th ahead of five more experienced drivers.
After a very windy practice session late in the afternoon, drivers were faced with cooler temperatures and less windy conditions entering the qualifying session for the Desert Diamond West Valley Phoenix Grand Prix.
Jones and Bourdais were 19th and 20th, respectively, in the qualifying order. Dale Coyne Racing’s rookie, put in a combined time of 38.7226 seconds for his two qualifying laps. His average speed of 190.029 mph was good to initially place him 14th. However, with two more cars left to qualify, he would end up 16th on the grid.
One of those cars was his teammate, Bourdais, who registered a total time of 38.4554 seconds and an average speed of 191.349 which would end up placing him 10th in the 21-car field.
The Desert Diamond West Valley Phoenix Grand Prix will be broadcast live on NBCSN at 9:00pm ET on April 29.
dalecoyneracing.com 