Daly confident in Dreyer & Reinbold Racing after “full step forward”
- James Scott
- 1 hour ago
- 3 min read
Conor Daly was full of praise for his Dreyer & Reinbold Racing (DRR) entry after the opening day of practice ahead of the 110th Indianapolis 500.
Daly ended the day third fastest and as the quickest Chevrolet entry. He turned his fastest lap at an average speed of 225.838mph, and also ran the second highest number of laps in the session.
Speaking about the opening day, Daly said: “Our car is fast. It just feels really good. So [we were] just kind of driving around and working through a few small things and, yeah, just tuning to kind of what I want and evaluating a few other things.”
“Just a good day one. Obviously the test was good too, but this whole process, you can get swept up in it. You can get behind, and you can get a little messy.”
DRR had already impressed in the Indy 500 Open Test, with Daly third on the time sheets.
“You don't want to fall behind in kind of overreacting to things. I think that's just kind of what our job is just go through things one step at a time, and it feels good so far.”
“I mean, not everyone is hiding everything at the open test, but everyone has their speedway cars now. So it's hard to argue that everyone is holding anything back now.
The middle of Tuesday’s practice session was quieter as teams avoided the scorching sun, however Daly and the two Ed Carpenter Racing (ECR) cars frequently punctured the calm and ran close together.
“We kind of got through our plan of running through three sets of tires. I mean, that's kind of what you're limited to per day if we have good weather, so that's why it kind of gets a little quiet, I would say, from time to time.”
“I spent most of the day around those ECR cars and kind of dicing it up with a lot of them. I guess I didn't expect to be tied for running a lot of laps like that or close to running the most laps, but I mean, we got to the end of each set of tires that we had.”
“So, yeah, I think we definitely know what we want to do for tomorrow. We identified a couple of things that we want to re-evaluate tomorrow.”
“I think the pack running and where I think I want to work on things as a driver is, lap 26 to 32 on tires. You hope to really not get to [lap] 32, but that's kind of where I really want to focus in on kind of keeping our balance consistent.”
This is Conor Daly’s second Indianapolis 500 with DRR, having recorded a tenth placed finish with the team in 2024. However, Daly feels that the team has improved greatly since their last partnership, taking “a completely full step forward [from 2024].”
“We still had a really good race car in '24. The car is fast, and that's some of the hardest things to get out of the car is just raw speed.”
“It just feels good. We're able to kind of do a lot with it. We can start deep in the pack and kind of mess around with some good cars and do some overtaking. But, yeah, I'm so impressed with what they do, honestly.”
“The fact that if you can stay focused during the offseason and use all those months to dial in your package here to be as fast as we've been in the first three days in this car, I mean, I think it's a great sign for anyone who wants to show up to try to compete at this race if you're full-time or not.”
Daly also reiterated that efficiency on pitlane will be essential, and a key focus of Wednesday’s practice session.
“When we get to do hot stops over the next two days, that's something that we're going to prioritize highly, right? Get all the pit crew, get everyone out there just hustling and slinging wheel guns around. That's going to be one of the more important elements for sure.”
It has certainly been an impressive start for both Daly and DRR as they hope to become the first one-off entry to win the Indianapolis 500 since Helio Castroneves in 2021.
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