Graham Rahal completed the podium at Road America on Sunday when the Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing driver finished third behind Will Power and Tony Kanaan.
Rahal battled hard with Kanaan and with Simon Pagenaud for the podium places throughout the fifty-lap race around the Elkhart Lake circuit, but felt his race was compromised early by an incorrect choice of tyre at the start, while he also felt he was weak around Canada Corner.
Rahal felt his podium opportunity had gone when Pagenaud made it passed both himself and Kanaan, only for the Team Penske driver to drop back down the field with an engine issue just after the end of the sole caution period of the race.
“We’re pleased with what we did here today and accomplished for the Gehl team,” said Rahal. “We can’t thank Gehl and PennGrade enough for making this happen for us. It was cool to have the yellow car back on track.
“We ran the new reds first and I think that hurt us a little bit. We learned from it and we’ll move on and do better here next year. It’s great to be back at Road America. This is my second third-place finish here in my IndyCar career so it’s cool to be back here and the fans are just amazing.
“For us, and our year, I think this was pretty big. We’ve been fast everywhere we’ve just had a lot of stuff go against us. To get a podium felt nice today. (Simon) Pagenaud and I, for like 20 some laps, he was right behind me and I was giving it everything I possibly had – there were sections I was better than him and then sections he clearly had me.
“I think in Canada Corner I was weak all weekend, but again, we battled hard and had a good day. The tire strategy hurt us and that’s how Pagenaud got back around us. We just made the wrong tire call and it definitely hurt. It is what it is and we still came out of here third.”
