After having a strong Friday at Barber Motorsports Park, Jack Hawksworth was unable to convert that into a good qualifying performance, and the British driver will start the fourth round of the Verizon IndyCar Series season from the seventh row of the grid.
Hawksworth had finished second in both Friday practice sessions for his AJ Foyt Enterprises team, and after the disappointment of qualifying, he was frustrated that he could not have continued his strong form.
The Briton felt the track conditions altered overnight, meaning the set-up that had performed so well on his and team-mate Takuma Sato’s car was not as good on Saturday, meaning both drivers were left down the order compared to Friday’s running.
“We just missed out-pretty frustrating to miss by just a hundredth,” said Hawksworth. “I wish I could have extracted just a bit more from the lap when it’s that close.
“It was a tricky day overall because the track temperature seems to have such an effect on the performance of the car. We rolled out this morning pretty similar to where we were last night and found the car to be too loose.
“To compensate for that, which wasn’t the right thing to do in hindsight because in the end with the reds and the track conditions in the afternoon, even though the temp went up, the balance seemed to go back to where it was last night. So we ended up with understeer.
“It’s frustrating because the basis of the car was pretty good. Very disappointed but we’ll go again tomorrow. It’s a long race, a lot can happen.”
