Rubens Barrichello admits he "liked what he saw" during his first day of testing in the IndyCar Series.
After 19 seasons at the highest level, the final curtain appears to have fallen on the Brazilian's Formula One career after Williams decided to replace him with Bruno Senna for the 2012 campaign.
Although the 39-year-old is refusing to give up on his dream of competing for a 20th season in F1, he turned his attention to the IndyCar Series and had a successful test run with KV Racing, co-owned by 1996 IndyCar Champion Jimmy Vasser, on Monday.
He completed 94 laps of the Sebring International Raceway in Florida and was impressed.
"I have still so much passion for speed and I'm quite young in my mind and I believe I'm getting better," he said.
"Right now I'm truly happy and I like what I saw. I just need to see what comes up. I need to talk to my family and to Jimmy."
Barrichello added: "In the morning I was getting used to the car and not doing anything silly because obviously you don't want to put it in the wall.
"It's a different machine from what I'm used to, but it had a good feeling, so I had a very good and productive day behind the wheel.
"You could call me a rookie, even though I've had 33 years doing this job, but here I was an IndyCar rookie."
Vasser admits he is keen to secure the services of the Brazilian as he had a very positive impact on KV Racing's main driver Tony Kanaan.
"We are all pleased with the test," he said.
"This was Rubens' first time in an IndyCar and I think he enjoyed himself. Certainly, we had a lot of fun working with him.
"Most importantly, if he is going to have this kind of effect on Tony we are going to have to figure out a way to keep him around."
