Sato pole run balances aggression and adjustment

Takuma Sato might not have the best results of his IndyCar career at Pocono Raceway, but the Andretti Autosport driver says he's always enjoyed the unique challenges the "Tricky Triangle" presents. Today, his embrace of that challenge paid off with a pole position for Sunday's second 500-mile race of the year for the Verizon IndyCar Series. Sato, of course, was the winner of the first, at Indianapolis.

"I've always enjoyed this track in the past. A difficult experience but I always enjoy it," said Sato. "That's why pole here is something very special, especially after the Indy 500, coming to another '500' race. The entire crew from the 26 did an outstanding job. Have to say big thank you to Michael [Andretti] and all Andretti Autosport. 

Sato acknowledged that support from his Andretti teammates – and the unfortunate results for one of them – had helped him make the right adjustments for his late run.

"I think not only my teammates, but also other drivers had challenging issues today, because of wind direction, because we trim [aero] so much," he noted, adding that the heavy crash for teammate Ryan Hunter-Reay "really made my nervous because he was just in front of me [in the qualifying order]. Ryan and I share a lot of philosophy and setup. What happens to him is what could happen to me, too. It sounds like he dropped a wheel to the inside of the yellow line in Turn 3, made the car upset. What made him do so, I don't know.

"But anyway, the most important thing, it's not failure, it's not something coming from nowhere, so basically the engineer just goes through the maximum data as possible and maybe we back off little bit of front wing to secure the rear a little bit. That's what we did. The rest of it, we have to adjust.

"Alexander [Rossi, pictured below celebrating with Sato afterward] came to me before the qualifying, he give me what he felt in Lap 1 to Lap 2, Turn 1 to Turn 3. Because here, it's a lot of downshifts. We had to deal with the weight jackers, had to really work on that. Everything was proactive."

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Although Sato's pole-winning run might have looked like another example of his "no attack, no chance" philosophy, the Japanese driver said it was actually a more balanced approach than observers of his fast 218 mph warm-up lap and high-pucker moment in Turn 1 on his second qualifying lap might have assumed.

"Yeah, a couple inches," he admitted of his close encounter with the wall. "I get used to that from Indy! This time it didn't hit, so...

"No, I mean, it was actually good. Nice and tidy, and very smooth. Everybody saw the second lap is a little bit off the pace because of [tire] degradation. To make consistent speed, you have to go relatively conservative in the warm-up lap – which means you can't feel the car, because basically you are down on speed and conserving the tires, and that means you don't know what's happening on that lap.

"I did kind of balance those. I needed to challenge on the warm-up lap, feel out the car. 'If I can really pull out the big lap on Lap 1 [then] keep going, it's only three corners to go anyway after Lap 1.' I felt that way.

"That's why in the second lap in Turn 1, I had to lift. Maybe because I was pushing so hard on the warm-up lap. It's always a balance. Still I think we kept reasonably good momentum, so I think the second lap was still very fast."

Indeed, Sato's second lap of 219.235 mph, while down from his opening tour above 220, was still faster than all but the top three drivers' averages.

While Sato's pole denied reigning series champ Simon Pagenaud a point toward the Frenchman's IndyCar title defense, Sato isn't yet prepared to accept a spoiler role for himself.

"I think it's mathematically still possible to challenge the championship, although it's a little bit unrealistic to challenge [for] winning," said Sato, who currently ranks seventh in points, 72 behind leader Josef Newgarden. "But as I said, mathematically it's possible. There's certainly no reason why we can't challenge for the win tomorrow. As you've seen in today's qualifying, anything can happen."