"We needed this": Graham Rahal revels in RLL's qualifying success at IndyCar's Sonsio GP

RLL star Graham Rahal qualified P2 for the 2025 Sonsio GP at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and will start the race on 10 May from the front row of the grid alongside Alex Palou. The IndyCar veteran came out and revealed the secret behind Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing's qualifying success at the IMS Road Course.

The three Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing cars finished the second practice session in the top three. While most teams saved a set of alternates for the qualifying during practice, RLL went out on the softer tires to gather data and get a feel for what the tire would be like.

The same gave the three RLL drivers, Graham Rahal, Devlin DeFrancesco, and Louis Foster an upper hand in the qualifying. Where all three Andretti failed to get out of the first qualifying session, all three RLLs made it into the Fast Six session.

Graham Rahal spoke with FOX Sports after the qualifying session and revealed how the run on alternate tires in practice helped the team.

“It feels so good because as I said to you after the last session, as to why we ran the reds (alternate). I knew Palou was going to have a new set of red to run into Fast Six,” said Rahal via X.

Speaking about his final lap in the Fast Six and the efforts made by his teammates, Graham Rahal suggested that RLL really needed a good result after a slow start to the season. He said:

“In fast six, like, just a great lap, put it together, the balance was really consistent and matched my best of the whole day. And it feels great for this entire #15, #30 and #45 team.”

“I mean, you guys know this. Everybody watching knows this, we needed this. We expect to be good at Indy Road course. But to see it come together and actually have three cars in the top five is amazing. So it feels awesome for our team,” added Graham Rahal.

Graham Rahal will start P2 with his rookie teammate Louis Foster starting behind him in P3. Devlin DeFrancesco will start P5 and was just half a tenth away from getting into the second row or grid.

“Needed to get a good taste”: Graham Rahal on RLL’s decision to use alternate tires in second practice at Sonsio GP

The top six drivers in the second practice session used a set of soft alternate tires in the final 10 minutes of the session. Although the tire is considered the better race tire, grid position is crucial at the IMS road course, and hence Graham Rahal prioritized getting a feel for the track on soft tires rather than saving them for the race.

AUTO: MAY 9 INDYCAR Sonsio Grand Prix - Source: Getty

Rahal detailed how not running an extra set of soft tires in qualifying hurt them at Barber, and hence, they opted for the move. He further explained that the pace in practice 1 at IMS wasn't great either, and therefore, RLL made the alternate decision.

“This one really came down to first session. If we thought we were good in the first session, we were not going to do it (use alternate tires in second session). But we weren’t that good, so we had to. We needed to get a good taste to understand what we need for qualifying,” said Rahal (via IndyCar).

IndyCar introduced new tire rules for the Sonsio GP, where the drivers are mandated to use two sets of alternate and primary tires each during the race, which will further change the dynamic.