IndyCar Gateway: O’Ward leads Power in practice

In the only practice session for this weekend’s Bommarito Automotive Group 500 – two races of 250 laps each – the rookies and first-time entrants in an IndyCar at the 1.25-mile oval got half an hour in which O’Ward turned 13 laps to set a 177.072mph lap to head Dale Coyne Racing with Team Goh’s Alex Palou.

However, as more and more rubber went down on the track through the one-hour session for which all 23 entrants took to the track, speeds kept climbing and the #5 Arrow McLaren SP’s eventual high point was 181.552 on the 66^th of 75 laps.

“We put a lot of very valuable work in that session,” O’Ward said. “We did everything we wanted to do to prepare for tomorrow’s qualifying and race. There’s so many little things that go into it that make a perfect race, so we want to make the best out of it.

“This Arrow McLaren SP crew gave us some really strong cars to roll out with, and I think it was just fine tuning from there. I ended the day really happy, and I think we will be ready for qualifying tomorrow."

His top effort put the 2018 Indy Lights champion more than 0.5mph clear of Power who turned more laps than anyone except Palou.

"We ran a lot and did some pretty long runs there to understand the car," said Power. "We didn’t have to change much because the Verizon Chevrolet was pretty good out of the box. I think we are pretty good, but I also ran a lot by myself. So, I’m not really sure where we are at in a pack. But overall, I’m happy with what we had today.”

Dixon made a late surge up to P3 in the Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda to unseat Conor Daly who is back in the Carlin-Chevy this weekend, trying to emulate the short-oval performance we saw from this combo in Iowa, where he took his and Carlin’s first IndyCar pole.

“I think we’re in a really good place with the No. 59 Gallagher Carlin Chevrolet for the races this weekend at World Wide Technology Raceway. We went out and did our qual sim pretty early in the session, and then the track just continued to get quicker as practice went on. We knew that was going to be the case, but we wanted to make sure we worked through everything we needed to with only one practice session.

"The tire seems to be a little different and it’s creating a different feel, but obviously we’re still quick, which is nice. It feels really good to roll off the truck again with a quick car, and so far it’s really just been an incredible effort by the Carlin team. I love this track so much, and with how strong we were here last year and how the car felt today, I’m feeling really good about where we are.”

Now two-time Indy 500 champion and defending WWTR winner Takuma Sato slotted in fifth for Rahal Letterman Lanigan-Honda while Jack Harvey of Meyer Shank Racing was sixth.

Palou held on to finish seventh fifth after going past the 100-lap barrier, but the Coyne team will be relying a lot on his feedback since teammate Santino Ferrucci – who led much of last year’s race here – suffered a mechanical fault and was towed back to the garage.

The Andretti Autosport-Honda team didn’t show particularly well, Alexander Rossi clocking a respectable 11^th, but Ryan Hunter-Reay was in handling difficulties and buried in 19^th, behind teammates Zach Veach and Marco Andretti.

Qualifying begins at 11am local (Central) time tomorrow and will be run as per Iowa. Each car gets a two-lap run, everyone’s first lap deciding the grid for Saturday’s race, the second deciding the grid for Sunday’s round.

Cla	Driver	Team	Laps	Time	Gap	Mph
1	Patricio O'Ward	Arrow McLaren SP	75	24.789		181.532
2	Will Power	Team Penske	81	24.867	0.078	180.961
3	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	55	24.886	0.097	180.822
4	Conor Daly	Carlin	57	24.919	0.130	180.581
5	Takuma Sato	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	53	24.939	0.150	180.434
6	Jack Harvey	Meyer Shank Racing	80	24.965	0.176	180.246
7	Alex Palou	Dale Coyne Racing with Team Goh	101	24.974	0.185	180.182
8	Marcus Ericsson	Chip Ganassi Racing	57	24.978	0.189	180.157
9	Rinus van Kalmthout	Ed Carpenter Racing	86	24.985	0.196	180.104
10	Colton Herta	Andretti Harding Steinbrenner Autosport	54	25.023	0.234	179.835
11	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	53	25.153	0.364	178.902
12	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske	64	25.157	0.368	178.874
13	Oliver Askew	Arrow McLaren SP	79	25.174	0.385	178.753
14	Tony Kanaan	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	52	25.220	0.431	178.426
15	Felix Rosenqvist	Chip Ganassi Racing	70	25.245	0.456	178.248
16	Zach Veach	Andretti Autosport	54	25.315	0.526	177.760
17	Marco Andretti	Andretti Herta Autosport with Marco & Curb-Agajani	56	25.325	0.536	177.687
18	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske	54	25.426	0.637	176.981
19	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	32	25.435	0.646	176.917
20	Ed Carpenter	Ed Carpenter Racing	59	25.449	0.660	176.824
21	Charlie Kimball	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	52	25.535	0.746	176.222
22	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	64	25.583	0.794	175.892
23	Santino Ferrucci	Dale Coyne Racing with Vasser Sullivan	40	25.880	1.091	173.874
View full results