VICS: Gabby Chaves Impresses in Indy

For the third practice for the 100^th Running of the Indianapolis 500 on Wednesday, Gabby Chaves, driver of the No. 19 Dale Coyne Honda, was in the top-five on the speed charts.

“I mean, we had a little bit of running, about 30 minutes of running on Monday, so today was our first full day, we got through a lot of changes, go through all our program, did some traffic runs, and like I say, I’m pretty pleased,” he said. “I haven’t had any uncomfortable situations out there today, and so I’m honestly just very, very pleased with the way the day has been going.”

The Bogota, Colombia native was a late addition to Dale Coyne Racing Indy 500 effort this year. He joins teammates Conor Daly, Pippa Mann and Bryan Clauson.

“Yeah, absolutely,” he said. “It’s the first time that I’ve worked with a multiple-car team during like an official event. Definitely something that I’m learning about and that definitely you benefit from when you’ve got a lot of data to share, a lot of ideas and heads working to make you go faster.”

Weather can be a definite factor to the car when on track and teams are working on figuring out the set up needed for the car.

“Yeah, essentially you want to try to get as close as you’re predicting race day to be, and I think there right at the end, it warmed up a little bit, more like what we can probably expect on race day,” he said. “Some good information that we learned.”

Chaves worked his way up from the Road to Indy ladder, he was the 2014 Indy Light Champion and was Rookie of the Year in the IndyCar Series in 2015. This will be his second start in the Indy 500.

“I, think every time you come to this place—it never gets easier, you’re just a little more used to it,” he said. “No, I am enjoying it out there. It feels better than last year.”

The historic 100^th Running of the Indianapolis 500 will be on Sunday May 29^th.