After finishing fourth in a one-off for KV Racing Technology last year, Townsend Bell will be armed with another strong team at his disposal for this year’s running of the Indianapolis 500.
The Chip Ganassi Racing/Sam Schmidt Motorsports combo had some success last year at the Brickyard with Alex Lloyd (now with Dale Coyne Racing). Lloyd and the team surprised folks by cracking the top 11 spots to make the field on the first day of qualifications, and on race day, he battled to finish a respectable 13th in the infamous pink HER Energy Drink machine.
Now Bell will take over the No. 99 CGR/Schmidt car, and the American driver is excited about the opportunity to take the group to the next level. He certainly has that chance, since he has help from two of the best squads in all of the IRL — the Ganassi team of the IZOD IndyCar Series and the Sam Schmidt Motorsports squad from the Firestone Indy Lights development series.
“I’m fired up,” said Bell during this week’s League teleconference. “We’re hoping it’s going to be a fast car. It’s been fun getting to know Sam and can’t argue with Ganassi’s success on the ovals. We’re looking forward to seeing what we get.”
The new compressed schedule for the ‘500’ seems to be playing into Bell’s anxiousness to get in the car as well. Practice for the Indy 500 won’t start until Saturday at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and he admitted that he missed the former “month of May” schedule. However, he gets the reasons why things are tighter this year.
“Practically speaking, [the new schedule] makes perfect sense,” he said about the matter. “Everyone runs the same chassis, same engine, same tires, essentially the same car it’s been for a long time now. It’s probably not necessary to spend three or four weeks running around when you can show up at a place like Kansas and have an event in essentially one day. But for traditional reasons, I miss the fact I’m not in Indy right now. I’m sitting in a parking lot in Southern California, getting ready to go in and do some more boxing training for the Indy 500.
“I wish I was in Indy, running around, enjoying the tradition, but I understand why.”
