In contrast to what the Atlantic teams had experienced throughout the Miler Lite 250 race weekend, Sunday greeted them with cool temperatures and mostly overcast skies for their final session before this afternoon’s 70-lap race. The rain looming on the horizon later today, Alex Figge (Worldspeed Motorsports/Wine Country Motorsports Redline Glycomax Airtrix Swift 014.a) jumped to the top of the speed charts with a time of 24.902 seconds (149.193 mph). Figge’s task now will be to climb through the field from his 13th starting spot, and catch race favorite, Ryan Hunter-Reay (Hylton Motorsports/Medlock Ames Winery Autobytel U.S. Print Swift 014.a), who was second this morning with a time of 24.903 seconds (25.408 mph).
The 15-minute session was cut short by seven minutes due to a contact incident between Eduardo Figueroa (Scuadra Fortia/Aviacsa Royse Maizoro Millenio Swift 014.a) and Stephan C. Roy (BBGP Racing/Playstation 2 Stereo Plus Swift 014.a) Figueroa and Roy touched sending both cars into the Turn 4 wall. Roy’s car took the most damage in the incident and it might be too severe to be repaired before the green flag drops today at 3:00 p.m. CST. Figueroa’s damage was much less and the car should be ready to go this afternoon. Both drivers were checked out at CART Medical and then released.
Alex Gurney (Dorricott Racing/Behr Castrol Swift 014.a) was third followed by Jon Fogarty (Dorricott Racing/Thomas Fogarty Winery & Vineyards Swift 014.a) and Ryan Dalziel (Michael Shank Racing Swift 014.a).
Carl Russo (Performance Development & Racing Swift 014.a) returned to the track this morning after yesterday’s incident in Turn 4. Sepp Koster (Michael Shank Racing/Blue Bay Golf Resort Uitert Respons Swift 014.a) will not take part in Round 3 of the CART Toyota Atlantic Championship after Friday’s practice incident in Turn 2.
Today’s CART Toyota Atlantic Championship race will be carried live on Speed Channel at 4:00 p.m. EST