Mick Schumacher continued his progress during the Unser IndyCar Open Test at Phoenix Raceway.
The 26-year-old German had a busy two days, clocking 222 laps (fifth-most) in three races on the 1-mile tri-oval track. He ultimately finished 18th on the combined speedometer with a flying lap time of 171.076 mph (21.0408 seconds).
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“It’s good,” Schumacher said. “We didn’t get as many runs (Wednesday) just because of the weather conditions, but what we did did was very effective and the changes were really fun. Overall, I think we feel confident knowing how we want to start our race weekend here and go from there.”
For Schumacher, who is about to make his IndyCar Series debut in Rahal Letterman Lanigan’s No. 47 Honda, it’s another step in his oval maturation.
Earlier this month, he got his start on the oval during a solo test day at Homestead-Miami Speedway, a 1.5-mile track with variable gradients. This time, at Sun Valley, where he shared the track with competitors for the first time, he noticed a big difference in getting the right line around the track.
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“Here, it’s very short,” Schumacher said. “This lap comes very quickly. They are high-G corners and are really fun to drive.
“I think what I’m most interested in is seeing how other people do it. Watching them actually drive around the track and seeing how they approach some of those corners is impressive and hopefully we can get there before the race weekend.”
When there were other cars on the track, it was also the first time Schumacher worked with his spotter, Jeff Troyer, who is considered one of the best spotters in the industry. Troyer has worked with riders such as Oriol Servia, Tomas Scheckter, the late Justin Wilson and was a backup for Josef Newgarden in his first championship in 2017.
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While side-by-side driving was limited during testing, the outing was still beneficial for Schumacher to learn the rhythm of having observers provide feedback on what was happening on the track.
In one instance, Troyer pointed to his rookie driver’s near miss on Tuesday when he quickly darted onto a car and tried to use the bank of the turn to lose speed, but quickly left the racing line and slid onto the track. Fortunately, Schumacher was able to keep it to the wall and keep going.
“I think all he did was give himself a little more space,” Troyer told Motorsport.com. “You know, he was just letting the car go a little further down the track to lose some speed instead of dragging the brakes.
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“When he did that, he came off the line and his tires were covered in pickups (tire pellets). The car took off. He did make it clear of the fence, but he came off the line and he picked up some gravel off the tire and he found out what it felt like to go off the line.”
But all in all, Schumacher appreciates this “new challenge.”
“It’s fun,” Schumacher said. “New challenges are always good. We’ve worked really hard as a team to get everything ready for our first oval race that’s going to be here in a few weeks. Yeah, I think we’re in a good position to learn and get everything ready for the first oval race.”
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