Indy 500: Jones tops rain-shortened Day 3 of practice

The planned seven hours of running was cut 90mins short by rain and thunderstorms, ensuring Jones’ eighth lap of 37, set this morning, remained fastest at 227.843mph. That was 1.5mph faster than the best lap of 2017 Indy winner Takuma Sato in the #30 Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing-Honda, who beat Zach Veach’s Andretti Autosport-Honda by 0.6mph.

Sebastien Bourdais in the Dale Coyne Racing with Vasser-Sullivan-Honda was fourth fastest ahead of the fastest rookie, Harding Steinbrenner Racing’s Colton Herta.

Sage Karam was the busiest driver of the day in the Dreyer & Reinbold Racing-Chevrolet, turning 86 laps, and finished up just ahead of the continually impressive Juncos Racing-Chevy of Kyle Kaiser, which is still bearing no sponsor logos.

Spencer Pigot ensured two Carpenter cars in the Top 10, ahead of Scott Dixon’s Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda and the fastest of the Team Penske-Chevrolets, Simon Pagenaud in 10^th.

Just ahead of Fast Friday, when the BorgWarner turbos are tweaked up to 1.4-bar boost in preparation for Saturday and Sunday qualifying runs, several drivers carried out qualifying simulations – low drag and without the aid of a draft from any other cars (IndyCar officially judges a car has a tow if it is within 10 seconds of the car in front – changed today from seven seconds).

In these speeds, too, Jones was fastest, clocking a 224.957, ahead of Pigot’s 224.887, Pagenaud’s 224.868, and Will Power’s 224.858. Next up were Charlie Kimball (Carlin), Marco Andretti (Andretti-Herta), Sato, Ed Carpenter, Josef Newgarden (Penske) and Arrow Schmidt Peterson Motorsport’s rookie Marcus Ericsson.

The only entry not to hit the track today was Fernando Alonso, whose McLaren Racing team is building up the John Cummiskey/Carlin-built car, following the F1 legend's shunt in the McLaren UK-built original. 

Session results:

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Time	Gap	Mph
1	63	Ed Jones	Ed Carpenter Racing	39.5008		227.843
2	30	Takuma Sato	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	39.7002	0.1994	226.699
3	26	Zach Veach	Andretti Autosport	39.8107	0.3099	226.070
4	18	Sébastien Bourdais	Dale Coyne Racing with Vasser-Sullivan	39.8238	0.3230	225.996
5	88	Colton Herta	Harding Steinbrenner Racing	39.9188	0.4180	225.458
6	24	Sage Karam	Dreyer & Reinbold Racing	39.9289	0.4281	225.401
7	32	Kyle Kaiser	Juncos Racing	39.9298	0.4290	225.396
8	21	Spencer Pigot	Ed Carpenter Racing	39.9406	0.4398	225.335
9	9	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	39.9467	0.4459	225.300
10	22	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske	39.9545	0.4537	225.256
11	3	Helio Castroneves	Team Penske	39.9747	0.4739	225.142
12	33	James Davison	Dale Coyne Racing with Byrd and Belardi	39.9886	0.4878	225.064
13	20	Ed Carpenter	Ed Carpenter Racing	39.9933	0.4925	225.038
14	12	Will Power	Team Penske	40.0252	0.5244	224.858
15	59	Max Chilton	Carlin	40.0353	0.5345	224.802
16	23	Charlie Kimball	Carlin	40.0361	0.5353	224.797
17	98	Marco Andretti	Andretti Herta Autosport with Marco & Curb-Agajani	40.0408	0.5400	224.771
18	48	J.R. Hildebrand	Dreyer & Reinbold Racing	40.0924	0.5916	224.481
19	25	Conor Daly	Andretti Autosport	40.0927	0.5919	224.480
20	7	Marcus Ericsson	Arrow Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	40.1060	0.6052	224.405
21	2	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske	40.1171	0.6163	224.343
22	27	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	40.1391	0.6383	224.220
23	31	Patricio O'Ward	Carlin	40.1481	0.6473	224.170
24	15	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	40.1547	0.6539	224.133
25	5	James Hinchcliffe	Arrow Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	40.1814	0.6806	223.984
26	60	Jack Harvey	Meyer Shank Racing with Arrow SPM	40.1817	0.6809	223.983
27	39	Pippa Mann	Clauson-Marshall Racing	40.2111	0.7103	223.819
28	77	Oriol Servia	Team Stange Racing with Arrow Schmidt Peterson	40.3075	0.8067	223.284
29	42	Jordan King	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	40.3274	0.8266	223.173
30	28	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	40.3454	0.8446	223.074
31	4	Matheus Leist	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	40.3644	0.8636	222.969
32	14	Tony Kanaan	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	40.3893	0.8885	222.831
33	81	Ben Hanley	DragonSpeed	40.4742	0.9734	222.364
34	10	Felix Rosenqvist	Chip Ganassi Racing	40.5960	1.0952	221.697
35	19	Santino Ferrucci	Dale Coyne Racing	40.8242	1.3234	220.457
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