Hunter-Reay happy to help Alonso at Indy until race starts

Although Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda’s Scott Dixon said that he expects Alonso to have a “fantastic shot” at victory at Indy, 2014 winner Hunter-Reay told Motorsport.com that he will continue to help the team’s two rookies right up until the race itself, despite his own ambitions for more glory at the Brickyard.

“For now, we’re just basically trying to get a car that does everything right,” he said, “getting that base format of a strong car – for all six of us.

“From there, we’ll each make adjustments to the car for different driving styles, pulling away from that basic setup. But although we’ll be going our different ways for qualifying in terms of trim levels, the ‘working together’ aspect of all the drivers on this team never stops.”

“In the race we won’t be helping each other,” he added. “I mean, obviously you don’t take teammates out, you don’t cut across the nose of a teammate at the end of a straight when he needs the clean air for turning – we’ll take care of each other to that extent. But we won’t be actually helping teammates out, no.

“But until then, it’s a situation where we all have to keep working together. The flow of information between us all does not get shut off at any other point.”

On the subject of whether he’s been distracted by the attention bestowed on Alonso by the media and fans, Hunter-Reay replied: “Honestly, I haven’t really seen the attention he’s got. I mean, I come out of the garage and I see people getting Fernando’s autograph, and that’s about all I’ve seen so far.

“So no it hasn’t been a distraction for me at all. We get on with our own program, and then in the garage, in debriefs, we’re sharing everything, like we always do in this team. He’s one more source of data, and that should be helpful.”