Live from Trackside - Firestone 550

Saturday, June 8

10:15 p.m.

It’s a little disappointing for the No. 83 team tonight because we had a great car and the crew did a really great job in the pits. I have no complaints with where we are, we just didn’t quite catch the yellows. We have had a lot of races where strategy and yellows have worked to our advantage, but tonight it just didn’t quite work out. We had a really good car, we just struggled a little bit with stuff out of our control. That’s fine. We’ll focus on the fact that we had a really good car. There was a stint we went past the car leading and drove away. I think it bodes well for the future, so I’m looking forward to going to Milwaukee next week since we had a really good test there and we’ll go racing.

Pre-race

Pit stop by the No. 83 crew

1:30 p.m.

It's race day! Just arrived at Texas Motor Speedway after a good nights rest and a good lunch. Beautiful weather so far... I think it will be a nice evening for the fans. 

This afternoon I have a couple of appearances and an autograph session before I jump in the car for the race. We'll have a good start from 8th, but as we know anything can happen here. It will be interesting to see how the cars handle toward the end of each stint to tonight. 

Be sure to tune in today at 8:30 pm Eastern live on ABC, and follow me on Twitter (@racewithinsulin) for updates during the race from my Pit Lane Reporter (PLR)! 

Friday, June 7

4:30 p.m.

I’m reasonably happy with qualifying today. We spent the whole hour and a half of practice working on the No. 83 NovoLog FlexPen car for the race tomorrow night, when it really counts. So, we kind of knew what we had but weren’t exactly sure. Overall, I’m pretty happy with that. We can continue to work on the race car tonight and be in good shape for tomorrow, starting from P8.

For now, I'm headed into an engineering meeting then hanging with fans at the Novo Nordisk FlexPen Tunnel in the INDYCAR Fan Village at 5:30 pm. We'll go back out for a half-hour practice under the lights at 6:45. 

Practice 

Pre-qualifying

Thursday, June 6
10:30 a.m.
Just landed here at DFW and am heading into the track. Looks like we'll have some pretty decent weather this weekend... any time the temps are under 95 degrees at Texas Motor Speedway, it will be a good weekend for those of us in firesuits!

Coming off of two recent top-10 finishes, the Novo Nordisk Chip Ganassi Racing team has some good momentum going as we head to Texas this weekend. Texas Motor Speedway is always a challenging track for us drivers, but that's what makes it a great race for fans. Last year we had a good race car but unfortunately just got caught up with issues in traffic. I think the No. 83 car will be fast again, and hopefully we can continue moving up the field to gain some more points toward the championship.

If you haven't yet, check out this piece on my engineer Brad on the Texas Motor Speedway site!

Here's your race weekend schedule (all times local/Central):
Friday, June 7
12:30-1:45 pm  Practice
3:30-5 pm  Qualifying
5:30 pm  Appearance at the Novo Nordisk FlexPen Tunnel in the INDYCAR Fan Village
6:45-7:15 pm  Practice
Saturday, June 8
3-4 pm  IndyCar autograph session in the INDYCAR Fan Village
7:30 pm  Firestone 550 race, live on ABC
Timing and scoring for all on-track session available here.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @racewithinsulin for updates from my Pit Lane Reporter (PLR)!