PHOENIX, AZ — So far so – perhaps unexpectedly – good for the Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing team, who locked out the second row in NTT IndyCar Series qualifying at Phoenix Raceway Saturday (March 6) afternoon with terrific runs from both Graham Rahal and Mick Schumacher.
Rahal will roll off third with his first top-five qualifying effort on a short oval since he started fifth at Richmond International Raceway in what was then just his second full season of open-wheel racing all the way back in June 2009.
And worth noting, too, that Rahal finished that race in third place. To put that into some sort of context, teammate Louis Foster, the 2025 Rookie of the Year, was just five years old when this last happened. So it’s been a while.
“You know, I am just super pleased for the team,” Rahal told Fronstretch after qualifying. “We have been working very, very hard at this, and I thought this morning was a good sign because I went out and I did that eight [laps] like easy right away. I was like, oh s***, OK, well, you know, that was nice, and then we didn’t really get a good run at the end of practice, so there were some question marks.”
But whatever question marks there might have been at the end of that first practice session, Rahal’s strong qualifying effort eviscerated them.
“You know, still for us, like this is a massive step forward and it just feels nice to be on an oval and not be chasing my ass all the time,” Rahal said.
Starting alongside Rahal on Saturday will be teammate Schumacher, who suffered a miserable opening lap wreck in his debut IndyCar race on the Streets of St Petersburg last Sunday; a crash that he could do absolutely nothing about.
The veteran German wheelman and son of seven-time Formula 1 World Champion Michael Schumacher took his sterling effort in stride when asked what he made of his qualifying run.
“Yeah, pretty quick, pretty short, but no, great, great to have, the experience. you know, I think we managed to get a good couple of laps together. So hopefully, we’ll be right in the mix, and then we can, yeah, manage to have a good start.”
Teammate Rahal was more effusive about Schumacher’s effort. “You know, I mean, I thought Mick did a hell of a job,” he said. “You know, first outing [on an oval], you know, first qualifying. I thought he was awesome.”
Danny Peters has written for Frontstretch since 2006. An English transplant living in San Francisco, by way of New York City, he’s had an award-winning marketing career with some of the biggest companies sponsoring sports. Working with racers all over the country, his freelance writing has even reached outside the world of racing to include movie screenplays.