THE MODERATOR: Good morning, and happy Carb Day. Holy cow, we have made it to race weekend! I'm utterly impressed that you guys made it here on time.
Moving on, I've probably milked these cow jokes enough, but glad to have these four Arrow McLaren teammates here. We'll spend about 10 minutes doing press conference style and then we'll go into scrum style for another 10 minutes.
We'll go ahead and get started. Pato O'Ward will roll off third in the front row to get started this weekend, Christian rolling off eighth, Kyle Larson in 19th and rookie for the race Nolan Siegel in 24th.
What has been your highlight of the month of May so far?
PATO O'WARD: Milking a cow this morning. Woke up for some morning milking, and it was a really cool experience.
CHRISTIAN LUNDGAARD: I think my best experience was listening to what he just said.
KYLE LARSON: I was going to say the same thing.
NOLAN SIEGEL: Mine is yet to come. It's going to be when they let me do something involved with the Wienie 500 like waving the green flag.
PATO O'WARD: Drivers, start your wieners! (Laughter.)
Q. It's two different kind of cars, Formula 1 and INDYCAR. Nevertheless, are there some engineering cooperation between your two teams from England to America? During the off-season INDYCAR is now finished quite early after German standard. Is there any sorts of plans for McLaren to give the Formula 1 guys to give some possibility to drive an INDYCAR and vice versa, INDYCAR driver in a Formula 1 car?
THE MODERATOR: I think the first question, Pato, you've been over and the reserve driver for the F1 so if you don't mind sharing how McLaren, F1 and INDYCAR overlap.
PATO O'WARD: Yeah, so with both being open wheel, there is certain things that can be learned from one to another, but it would be a lot less than you think because Formula 1 is a constructor's championship; you obviously create the car. In INDYCAR it's more spec.
I do think a lot of the development that actually goes on in INDYCAR isn't really looked through in so much depth in Formula 1 because what we focus on is parts that -- well, that are aero usually, it's just so aero dependent and focused.
I will say there's been some crossover from marketing people, from engineering, as well, especially for this weekend and for the 500. There's a lot of people from the UK that came here to help over here. There is some overlap.
But I wouldn't say it's for every weekend. I would say just more select events.
There's obviously some things that you can learn from one to another, but I would say it's a lot less than what people think because they don't translate to each other.
THE MODERATOR: On your second question, I think we'll let Zak answer that at some point. No immediate plans for the crossover from the F1 guys over here, but never say never. He'll answer at some point, I'm sure. Right now we're focused on Kyle as our fourth driver.
Q. Christian, there's a lot of talk about the pushing that you are doing in performance against Pato. Do you feel like this is -- how do you describe how that helps the team going up?
CHRISTIAN LUNDGAARD: Yeah, I mean, to me, I assume Pato would agree with this, to me it's very simple. I never came into this team to take Pato's space. I came here to try to improve the overall package. The only feedback that I've been given is it's going in the right direction, and at the end of the day, we both want to beat each other, but we also want to beat everybody else. I think that's what we're really focused on is we're picking our battles, and I think there is huge respect between the two of us on the track and even off the track.
We want to help and improve the package as a team, and one car is going to be stronger one race and the other is going to be stronger in another race, and I think we're at peace with that, and I think we've seen it already.
I think both of us will be happy to be fighting each other for wins at every single race.
Q. Nolan, I think also the improvement in the team is seen in your side of the garage. What do you describe as the dynamic in the group that you feel like the team is changing after your first year and this year?
NOLAN SIEGEL: Yeah, well, on my side, obviously, I have a bit more learning to do than these guys. We're coming up to a stretch of races that I did last year, and I think that that'll be much easier for me in a sense going back to places that I've been before, and that'll be a bit of a change. I think there's been a big improvement on my side just coming off of races that I haven't been to before. There's just a big learning curve.
But no, I feel like we've done a good job and the qualifying performance has been good. We've had strong races, and it's just kind of starting to come together. I think results will follow.
On the team side, we changed a lot this off-season. Obviously TK being a team principal now, the 6 car group, core group, changed a lot over the off-season, and I think there have been a lot of really positive changes, and we've made a huge amount of progress as a group. Like Christian is saying, I think there's been progress on the car. I think there's also been progress on kind of all sides of the team, whether even not necessarily car performance related sides of the team.
On the outside, it looks like a lot of changes that might be scary, but I think they've been really, really positive, and that's showing in the performance.
Q. Kyle, I'm sure you've probably been asked this, but what has the support been like? How has that made you feel kind of getting the support from the NASCAR side, from whether it be drivers that are reaching out to you, and also, on the converse of that, being here, the INDYCAR fans that are so supportive of you doing this milestone?
KYLE LARSON: Yeah, I think everybody can respect somebody doing the double, so it does -- I notice the support, and from the fans especially probably more than anything.
Yeah, it always makes you feel good that you feel like there's a large amount of people cheering you on.
So yeah, hopefully we can just make everybody proud this weekend and do a good job in both races and just try our best.
Q. Have you spoken with Tony Stewart or any of those guys at all or not really necessarily?
KYLE LARSON: I talked to Tony on the phone the other day mostly just because he's getting in the broadcast booth on Sunday so he was checking in to see how things were going and what may be different than last year and stuff like that. It was good to catch up with him. I haven't talked to him in a while, so it was good to chat on the phone.
Q. Pato, as you enter this race on Sunday, where do you feel like you guys' race car package is from where you guys have had it the last couple years?
PATO O'WARD: We've still got work to do, I would say. I don't think that we're as far along as we have been in years past. I do think we nailed it in qualifying. At least with my car I was pretty happy with it, as happy as I've ever been for 500 qualifying. But for the race car it's been a bit more of a challenge. Today's two hours are going to be really important to kind of dialing her in.
But I don't think we're far away, but we're definitely not -- I don't see, at least my car, was even close to some of the other stronger cars that I've seen, where it's like, ooh -- I feel like there's a bigger difference from strong cars to average to, like, weak cars this year. It seems like the change is quite a bit more than years past. Yeah, just trying to get a little bit better and a bit more comfortable.
Q. Kyle, do you feel like this year is less attention and spotlight on your attempt than last year?
KYLE LARSON: Yeah, I actually like that a lot. I feel like I get a lot of attention in everything that I do and race, and I don't really like that because I feel like it takes away from the spotlight of others. This year has been better because I feel like I've kind of flown under the radar a little bit more. Not really under the radar, still obviously an important thing, and I have still gotten a lot of coverage. But last year I felt, like, crazy.
It's been good. It's been more normal, and I like it that way.
Q. How much is it the Pato effect? You don't have anyone like that in NASCAR to take some of that attention away from you.
KYLE LARSON: Yeah, we're all pretty vanilla at Hendrick, but he's not. I feel like most of the INDYCAR garage, though, has got good personalities, so we need more guys like Pato in NASCAR.
Q. Pato, I did not wake up to see you milk the cow, so tell us how you enjoyed your experience.
KYLE LARSON: He loved it.
PATO O'WARD: I really did. The experience was great. Woke up, excited to wake up to milk a cow. Quite interesting. Very warm, you know, gotta warm her up. Her name was Rihanna. Yeah, she was fabulous. Did you see a video at least? You'll see, first try.
THE MODERATOR: We will split up into scrums and then Tony Kanaan will also join. We've got about 10 minutes before the guys have to get off to the drivers' meeting.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports