Bourdais predicts a less spirited race at Indy

Highest ranked among the Honda drivers on the grid, the Frenchman from Dale Coyne Racing will start 5th after posting his best qualifying performance last weekend on the most famous oval in the world. Once again at the forefront during the last free practice sessions with the 4th time of Carb Day on Friday, Bourdais was not, however, completely satisfied with the approach to the American classic.

« I have the impression that we are a little at the limit of the grip and a little exposed, he told AUTOhebdo. We have a car that is fast, maybe a little too fast. Since the start of last week, we have the impression of being in a general load deficit.

When we had a bit of leeway with cooler conditions and cloud cover, with the rear wing turned to the maximum value of +2 degrees, I said to myself, 'It's okay, we're in the game, we can fight because we don't won't be in too much trouble.

But there, when we lose a new level in terms of grip, it becomes really complicated. It will be even warmer on Sunday. We have our backs against the wall and everyone complains but there are different degrees of difficulty. ».

Bourdais, who missed the 2017 edition of the Indy 500 following a terrible accident in qualifying, goes on to explain how following a rival is particularly difficult this year.  

« Arriving 2 car lengths behind, it starts to get really tangent, says Le Manceau. You are at the limit of the front, at the limit of the rear. You can do what you want with the tools at your disposal, when the car starts to drift a little from the rear when entering a corner and in the middle and exit you are limited to understeer while you barely touched the steering wheel, you didn't really feel like you had any room to maneuver. And you have no margin.

And that's behind a car so we can imagine what it's like when you're following two, three, four, five cars. I have a bit of a feeling that track position is going to be very important this year, which is very rare here. Generally at 500 Miles it's still really dynamic. You only have the leader who cannot remain leader.

There, the guys who were leading the way in free practice, there weren't many who were overtaken. And again, we were not in extreme conditions planned for the race ».

The Indianapolis 500, 102nd of the name, starts Sunday at 12:00 p.m. local time, or 18:00 p.m. French time. Like his compatriot simon pagenaud (Team Penske), second on the grid, Bourdais will try to join the French Jules Goux and René Thomas, winners in 1913 and 1914 respectively, on the Indy list.