Written by Christopher Estrada | 21 February 2012

Packed week of testing rolls on at Texas, Barber and Phoenix

Tuesday's private test at Texas Motor Speedway may have only featured three drivers, but it was still an important test nonetheless.

Ryan Briscoe (Team Penske/Chevy), Tony Kanaan (KV Racing Technology/Chevy) and Alex Tagliani (Barracuda-BHA/Lotus) all put in both individual and side-by-side/drafting sessions on the 1.5-mile oval according to the series. The goal of their efforts was a big one, indeed: Nailing down a baseline aero package for the new Dallara DW12 on high-speed ovals such as TMS, Indianapolis and Auto Club Speedway.

The series reports that Dallara aero add-ons tested in the DW12's trip through the Windshear wind tunnel last month were used on the cars, which featured some differences from its testing last fall.

TMS will play host to an Open Test for the entire IZOD IndyCar Series on March 13.

Meanwhile, the Honda gang (plus Briscoe's two Penske teammates, Helio Castroneves and Will Power) finished off their two-day session at Barber Motorsports Park near Birmingham, Alabama. A.J. Foyt Racing's Mike Conway led the way on Monday with a 1:10.7 second lap in the No. 14 ABC Supply Honda, but Tuesday saw the Chip Ganassi Racing team top the sheets with a 1:09.96 second lap from Graham Rahal according to SPEEDTV.com's Marshall Pruett.

Pruett also reports that the test was used to help determine Firestone tire compounds for the Barber round in April and also break in revised software on the McLaren-made ECU.

Finally, the "IndyCar to Phoenix" contingent has one new member -- Andretti Autosport driver Marco Andretti, who tweeted his support Tuesday for an open-wheel revival in the Valley of the Sun:

"@IndyCar needs to come back to Phoenix! The new banking will produce as good if not better racing than Iowa! RT!"

Andretti's tweet is referring to the progressive banking created as part of PIR's recent reconfiguration, which has made the track a bit different compared to the last time the IndyCars were in town. Despite its status as a track with plenty of open-wheel history, PIR has not hosted the series since 2005.

PIR is playing host to a two-day session with Andretti and Panther Racing's J.R. Hildebrand, but it wouldn't be surprising if somebody decided to call this a feasibility test of sorts for a potential race next year. Last December, word came out that the one-mile oval was open to discussing an IndyCar date for 2013.

After the Phoenix session wraps up today, five squads will test Thursday and Friday at Sebring International Raceway in Florida: Ganassi (Dario Franchitti, Scott Dixon, Rahal and Charlie Kimball), Sam Schmidt Motorsports (Simon Pagenaud), Rahal Letterman Lanigan (Takuma Sato), Lotus Dreyer & Reinbold Racing (Oriol Servia) and Lotus HVM (Simona de Silvestro).

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