HILLIARD, Ohio - And now we’re back where we started/Here we go around again - The Kinks

Things will look familiar on an IndyCar Series weekend for the first time in Ryan Hunter-Reay’s (#17 Ethanol Dallara/Honda/Firestone) IRL career as he and his Rahal Letterman Racing squad will head to the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course for this weekend’s Honda Indy 200 Presented by Westfield Insurance.

It was at the 2.258-mile road course in Lexington, Ohio where Hunter-Reay made his first IndyCar appearance last year, joining Rahal Letterman Racing as the team made a mid-season driver change. Despite not having a minute of testing in an IRL car, Hunter-Reay qualified 10th and finished seventh, starting a six-race charge that would end up earning the Floridian the Bombardier Learjet Rookie-of-the-Year Award.

The performance also punched his ticket for the 2008 season in the Ethanol-sponsored car, which now returns him to Mid-Ohio, which is the first track all year where he has previously competed in an IndyCar Series machine.

“I guess this weekend’s trip to Mid-Ohio puts an end to any talk of me being a rookie anymore,” grinned Hunter-Reay, who also won the Chase Indy 500 Rookie-of-the-Year Award this season. “Frankly it will be good to start getting to tracks where I have experience in the IRL cars, and especially at a place like Mid-Ohio where I have always been comfortable even back to my rookie year in Champ Cars.”

Hunter-Reay has been at his best on the road and street courses since joining the IndyCar Series, qualifying in the top 10 in each of his five non-oval starts and earning a spot in the Firestone Fast Six qualifying format in each of the last three road- and street-course events. His success at Mid-Ohio is not limited to his sparkling effort a year ago either as he earned his first podium in the big cars there in 2003 when he started second and finished third with a first-year Champ Car team.

“I can not wait to get to Mid-Ohio as it is one of my favorite tracks anywhere in racing,” Hunter-Reay said. “You have to be smooth and flowing with your driving style. It has a great combination of fast corners, elevation changes and tight turns that takes it about as far away from a point-and-shoot street course as a track can be. The fact that Mid-Ohio is Rahal Letterman Racing’s home event and with the success that Bobby had there as a driver makes it even more special. It was cool for me last year to see just what a following Bobby still has with the Mid-Ohio fans. He’s mobbed like Helio Castroneves there!”

Things get underway Friday at Mid-Ohio with a pair of practice sessions, leading to Saturday’s Firestone Fast Six qualifying, which begins at 11:45 a.m. The Honda Indy 200 Presented by Westfield Insurance takes place at 1:30 p.m. Sunday afternoon and can be seen live on ABC.
 

Rahal Letterman Racing Mid-Ohio Notes:
 

The 2.258-mile road course tucked into the cornfields of Central Ohio has been a staple of major-league open-wheel racing for nearly 30 years, having hosted Indy Cars for the first time in 1980. The track, which is located about  50 miles north of Rahal Letterman Racing’s Hilliard headquarters, provides a number of challenges for even the most seasoned drivers with its variety of turns and elevation changes. The IndyCar Series made its debut at Mid-Ohio in 2007, having run the 22 previous events under the CART/Indy Car/Champ Car sanction up until 2003. Former World Driving Champion Emerson Fittipaldi is the only driver to win three Indy Car events there, while Bobby Rahal won two races and two poles at the track in the early 1980s.
 

Ryan Hunter-Reay will make his 61st open-wheel start this weekend and his first on a road course since he won at Watkins Glen two weeks ago to score his third IndyCar victory. He will make his third IndyCar start at Mid-Ohio, and has both started and finished in the top 10 in both of his previous starts there. He made his official IndyCar Series debut there in 2007, joining Rahal Letterman Racing as part of a mid-season driver change.  He qualified 10th and finished seventh. He started second in the Champ Car event in 2003 and finished third for his first podium finish.
 

Team Facts - Rahal Letterman Racing has made 23 starts at Mid-Ohio dating back to the team’s inception in 1992. As Rahal Letterman Racing, the team has yet to win at Mid-Ohio, although as a driver, Bobby Rahal won back-to-back races in 1985 and ‘86. Bryan Herta was on pole there in 1997 but finished 24th. RLR has 11 top-10 finishes there and eight top-five results. The team has qualified in the first two rows for six Mid-Ohio events and has started in the top 10 in 14 of its 23 events. Rahal’s third-place finish in 1998 from 16th place on the starting grid was the last podium of his illustrious career.