91st INDIANAPOLIS 500 PRESS CONFERENCE
> 
> Milka Duno, Davey Hamilton
> 
> Sunday, May 6, 2007, Indianapolis Motor Speedway
> 
> 
> 
> MODERATOR: Welcome to the Economaki Press Room for the 91st running of the 
> Indianapolis 500. A familiar face and a new face to the Speedway here. Of 
> course, many of us know Davey Hamilton’s story. Suffice it to recall, he 
> finished second in Indy Racing League IndyCar Series points and one of the 
> really stalwart drivers in the early days of the Indy Racing League. We’re 
> delighted to have Milka Duno with us, who comes from a great deal of fanfare. 
> Those of you who have been on the IndyCar trail will recall her win in a very 
> exciting Grand American Rolex Series race at Homestead Miami Speedway a couple 
> of years ago, so Milka also comes with some great credentials. Davey, we’ll 
> start with you. I talked to you this morning and you said, “We’ve got to knock a 
> little rust off.” Did you get that done this afternoon?
> 
> 
> 
> HAMILTON: Yeah, we did. We’re going fast around here. I remember that now. It 
> was good. The car was solid. We just went through one set of tires and just got 
> comfortable, and I did that. I was excited coming into the day, and it’s been a 
> long time, like I said. Vision (Racing) gave me a great car and made it easy, so 
> hopefully it just stays as it was today. It was really good.
> 
> 
> 
> MODERATOR: Milka, of course, you were at Kansas Speedway and went through all of 
> the tests there and completed the race, which was your goal. Your first time out 
> at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, tell us about your first day here.
> 
> 
> 
> DUNO: I am so happy because the people here made me feel so welcome in 
> Indianapolis. I didn’t think I would have so many fans, so many people so fast. 
> During the test, it wasn’t so easy for me. Like Davey says. I was out there the 
> first few laps and I was saying, ‘Oh, what am I doing here?’ Really, it’s a 
> tough track. I understand now when the drivers and the people say that it’s the 
> most difficult track, it really is. Everything happens so quick, so fast, the 
> track is so tight. You have to be precise in every corner, and the four corners 
> are so different. You have to drive with so much concentration and be so precise 
> with the steering; it really is a very tough track. I have many people around me 
> with a lot of experience and I take full advantage of that. The only way to 
> learn and the fast way to learn is to ask all day to everybody, to all the guys 
> on my team, to my engineers, to Pancho Carter, to everyone I see. To Rick Mears, 
> to everybody, because I must take advantage of what I have around. I have many 
> people with a lot of experience and I want to improve in a fast way, so I’m 
> doing what I have to do. Ask, no? It’s the only way I have to learn.
> 
> 
> 
> MODERATOR: I would think Davey, you could relate to that, the way you came 
> through sprints and supermodifieds and midgets and such to the IndyCar Series, 
> and there’s similarities, but there’s differences, as well.
> 
> 
> 
> HAMILTON: Well, the first thing she said, the track. This track is so unique. 
> The corners, they’re all different. They all look the same, but every corner has 
> a different character to it. You have to learn them again, and what’s helped me 
> a lot is that two-seater program. I don’t know if you guys have been for a ride 
> with me or not in that thing, but I have a lot of laps in that two-seater 
> program. That helps a lot because the line is the same, the track is the same, 
> the walls are in the same place. So that helped me. I had a little advantage of 
> today, I was more confident to get back into a car and do that, and the speed is 
> a lot different. It was back to getting used to the speed and like I said, it 
> was a great race car. The setup that we had today was our race setup, so I feel 
> pretty good because it was fairly easy. It was fairly easy to drive, and now 
> it’s just one step at a time. I’ve got great teammates with Ed (Carpenter), 
> Anthony (Foyt), and Tomas (Scheckter) helping me out here all month. The great 
> thing for me, as well, is that I get to run the whole month. When I came back, I 
> wanted to make sure I had a proper program and with Hewlett-Packard coming 
> aboard and AMD, Vision Racing has let me have an opportunity to do it with a 
> great team, which is a great thing and it’s proper. It’s done in a proper way.
> 
> 
> 
> MODERATOR: Let’s open it up for questions.
> 
> 
> 
> Q: Milka, you’ve won in road racing, but you’ve run, only by yourself on this 
> racetrack. At the end of the month, do you think you’ll be able to run for three 
> hours, in traffic, at 200 and some miles and hour, and how different is that 
> going to be from a road race for you?
> 
> 
> 
> DUNO: Even when I’m on a road course and I’m driving with another driver, I’m 
> still driving on long runs. When we have 24 hours, I would be driving two and a 
> half hours. Also, when I was racing in Le Mans, I was racing two hours and 30 
> minutes continually. This is good preparation. The road courses are very 
> difficult and very tough races, you can imagine. To go flat at Daytona for 
> example, you have to be so perfect with the car. Here, to go flat with the car 
> and the banking, it’s very easy because you have a lot of downforce. But every 
> different car, you have to drive a different way. Here you are going quicker, 
> but it helps you to go quick. And I think that a road course and those cars have 
> helped me so much with this. With the temperatures, it was so hot inside. It was 
> 120 degrees in the seat, you have to brake, and there’s fast and slow cars. You 
> have to work so much inside the car, that I think it was good preparation. I 
> knew that at the last race in Kansas, because I didn’t know what could happen. I 
> raced two hours in Kansas, and it was OK. I have conditions that I have to keep, 
> and even have to improve.
> 
> 
> 
> Q: Davey, when you did your ROP, it was a lot different. They held it a few 
> weeks before Opening Day, but you came from an open-wheel, oval-track 
> background. Can you talk about how difficult it must be for a driver like Milka, 
> who basically just ran her first open-wheel, oval-track race a week ago, to be 
> able to go through it so quickly, and kind of compare what it was like when you 
> went and did it?
> 
> 
> 
> HAMILTON: I think that she has, coming from the short track, and those 
> open-wheel cars, and it has the same feel of this race car, but coming to such a 
> larger track and so much more speed, was difficult for me, but she has the 
> endurance part. You know, she’s been in three hours before. She’s been in 
> 24-hour races. Her races have been very long, so she should be very good at 
> that. Yeah, when you take that roof off and you take the doors away and you’re 
> by yourself in that little cockpit, it’s a whole different atmosphere for you 
> get around here. Like I say, my first open-wheel race was in Kansas, and I think 
> she proved to me and a lot of people that she did a great job. She did what she 
> was supposed to do, which was bring the car home and she got a lap down, but if 
> you look at the end of the race, so I think she’s going to be fine. The fact is, 
> this place is the most difficult racetrack there is. I don’t know why I chose 
> this one to come back. I guess it’s because it’s the biggest one in the world, 
> but it is the most difficult.
> 
> 
> 
> Q: Can you compare it to when you did your ROP?
> 
> 
> 
> HAMILTON: You know, it’s been a long time. The first time around this racetrack, 
> I think I paid more attention to the grandstands and look around at the 
> magnitude that I was finally here and the scoring pylon and the Pagoda, well the 
> Pagoda wasn’t here then, but the tower, and just soaking in where I wanted to be 
> my whole life. Ron Hemelgarn gave me that opportunity and I was able to go 
> through ROP in 1991, but I didn’t race. 1995 was my first opportunity to really 
> race, and my first race was in ’96, I think. So each time, I just kind of picked 
> away at it and got something, but it was a very intimidating place my first 
> time.
> 
> 
> 
> Q: Davey, did you ever give up hope of coming back here and racing after your 
> first accident, and for Milka, what did you know about the Indy 500 before you 
> came here today?
> 
> 
> 
> HAMILTON: Yeah, I did lose hope, actually. You know, when you’re laying in a 
> hospital for two years, basically, and you’ve had 21 surgeries and not knowing 
> how you’re going to walk, it’s kind of hard to know if you’re going to have the 
> opportunity. Then once I felt confident that I was healthy enough, that I could 
> physically get the job done, it’s not as easy as just going to a car owner and 
> getting that trust that you can do it. It was just something that you have to 
> try. That’s when the Sinden guys gave me the opportunity in the two-seater, and 
> it helped a lot. It also helped a lot to get my feet working on the clutch and 
> the gas and the brake and getting out of the pits all the time. But everything 
> happens for a reason. I almost got in this race last year. We were close, I 
> mean, we were to the design of the car the day before I was supposed to get in 
> it, and then the thing fell apart over night. It gave me a full year to really 
> progress on that and get sponsors. I mean, when Hewlett-Packard came on board 
> and AMD came along and Ken Thompson, Incorporated came along, it just happened 
> and fortunately, I’m with a great team.
> 
> 
> 
> DUNO: My career is not like other drivers. They all, from a very young age, 
> wanted to be a race car driver. Ever since I was 5 years old, 8 years old, I 
> always wanted to be an engineer. My career had a focus in another direction. 
> This is why I studied so much. I didn’t follow racing. I didn’t start following 
> racing until I started racing in 1999. That was when I started to learn about 
> many different championships. I was sitting here in 1999 when I started racing, 
> I was sitting in the stands in Turn 4. I was watching the cars thinking, ‘Oh, 
> how impressive these cars are; how fast are they going?’ That’s when I said, 
> ‘One day, I want to do that.’ Eight years later, I am here. I am so happy for 
> this opportunity. I appreciate so much my people and my sponsors and everyone 
> who has helped me to be here in the IndyCar Series. Just to everyone because it 
> was a dream that has come true, after eight years, I’m here. I haven’t had a 
> traditional career like the other drivers, but it’s something that, I think, if 
> there’s something you want to do, if you have the determination, there’s a way. 
> You don’t let anybody intimidate you and prepare, and you can do anything.
> 
> 
> 
> MODERATOR: Any more questions? Well, thank you both very much.