Long Beach IndyCar: Herta tops first practice, Palou shines
Colton Herta put Andretti Autosport-Honda on top in opening practice for the returning Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach, while champion-elect Alex Palou’s first encounter with the course resulted in an impressive third.
Photo by: Joe Skibinski
While the track was still green, Romain Grosjean and Josef Newgarden had incidents at Turn 9 within two minutes of each other – the Dale Coyne Racing with RWR driver slid slightly long but reversed and continued, while the Penske driver locked up when his front wheels got airborne over a bump. His spin resulted in him merely kissing the tire wall, but when he tried to get going again, the car stalled. His restart required a red flag.
Colton Herta then became the first driver under the 70sec barrier with a 69.8160sec, before two-time Long Beach-winning teammate Alexander Rossi clipped 0.022sec off that time to go top.
Then the reds flew again, as Oliver Askew struck a wall with the right-rear of his Rahal Letterman Lanigan-Honda, bending a wishbone and flattening a tire at Turn 1. This came not long after the 2019 Indy Lights champion, who has never raced at Long Beach before, had already grazed his left-side front and rear tires. Out came the second red.
Herta then cut more than half a second from his best to turn the first 102mph lap of the weekend, while teammate Ryan Hunter-Reay made it an Andretti Autosport 1-2-3, and then James Hinchcliffe made it an AA 1-2-3-4, despite a lock-up at Turn 9.
Dalton Kellett made the same error but skidded straight on, necessitating a third red flag to retrieve the AJ Foyt Racing car from the runoff, just as Chip Ganassi Racing’s outgoing six-time champion Scott Dixon slid on at Turn 1 and gently kissed the tire barriers.
Then Ganassi’s likely incoming champion Palou upset the Andretti symmetry with a 69.4554, while Simon Pagenaud – earlier to be found down an escape road – jumped ahead of him to clinch second.
At the session’s close, as the track picked up pace, Felix Rosenqvist delivered fourth-best time, while his title contending teammate at Arrow McLaren SP, Pato O’Ward was a very disconsolate 16th.
Hunter-Reay retained fifth ahead of Meyer Shank Racing-Honda’s Helio Castroneves who has started this race from pole four times and holds the lap record here (2017).
Rookie Scott McLaughlin was second fastest of the Team Penske-Chevys with seventh, while Romain Grosjean – another Long Beach newbie – finished 10th.
Jimmie Johnson clocked 27th, 2sec off the pace, after a couple of confidence-sapping spins.
P |
Name |
FTime |
Diff |
FL |
Laps |
FSpeed |
Engine |
Tire |
Team |
1 |
Colton Herta |
1:09.2680 |
1:09.2680 |
11 |
17 |
102.281 |
Honda |
P |
Andretti Autosport |
2 |
Simon Pagenaud |
1:09.4334 |
0.1654 |
17 |
17 |
102.037 |
Chevy |
P |
Team Penske |
3 |
Alex Palou |
1:09.4554 |
0.1874 |
21 |
22 |
102.005 |
Honda |
P |
Chip Ganassi Racing |
4 |
Felix Rosenqvist |
1:09.4870 |
0.2190 |
17 |
17 |
101.959 |
Chevy |
P |
Arrow McLaren SP |
5 |
Ryan Hunter-Reay |
1:09.5154 |
0.2474 |
11 |
15 |
101.917 |
Honda |
P |
Andretti Autosport |
6 |
Helio Castroneves |
1:09.5703 |
0.3023 |
21 |
21 |
101.837 |
Honda |
P |
Meyer Shank Racing |
7 |
Scott McLaughlin |
1:09.6212 |
0.3532 |
21 |
21 |
101.762 |
Chevy |
P |
Team Penske |
8 |
James Hinchcliffe |
1:09.6276 |
0.3596 |
14 |
14 |
101.753 |
Honda |
P |
Andretti Steinbrenner Autosport |
9 |
Alexander Rossi |
1:09.7940 |
0.5260 |
5 |
15 |
101.510 |
Honda |
P |
Andretti Autosport |
10 |
Josef Newgarden |
1:09.8557 |
0.5877 |
14 |
14 |
101.420 |
Chevy |
P |
Team Penske |
11 |
Romain Grosjean |
1:09.8807 |
0.6127 |
13 |
18 |
101.384 |
Honda |
P |
Dale Coyne Racing w/RWR |
12 |
Will Power |
1:09.9916 |
0.7236 |
10 |
16 |
101.224 |
Chevy |
P |
Team Penske |
13 |
Scott Dixon |
1:10.0535 |
0.7855 |
8 |
18 |
101.134 |
Honda |
P |
Chip Ganassi Racing |
14 |
Ed Jones |
1:10.1145 |
0.8465 |
12 |
15 |
101.046 |
Honda |
P |
Dale Coyne Racing with Vasser Sullivan |
15 |
Jack Harvey |
1:10.1758 |
0.9078 |
11 |
15 |
100.958 |
Honda |
P |
Meyer Shank Racing |
16 |
Pato O'Ward |
1:10.2451 |
0.9771 |
16 |
17 |
100.858 |
Chevy |
P |
Arrow McLaren SP |
17 |
Marcus Ericsson |
1:10.3153 |
1.0473 |
4 |
17 |
100.758 |
Honda |
P |
Chip Ganassi Racing |
18 |
Sebastien Bourdais |
1:10.3788 |
1.1108 |
13 |
18 |
100.667 |
Chevy |
P |
AJ Foyt Enterprises |
19 |
Graham Rahal |
1:10.5113 |
1.2433 |
7 |
18 |
100.478 |
Honda |
P |
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
20 |
Rinus VeeKay |
1:10.7374 |
1.4694 |
21 |
21 |
100.156 |
Chevy |
P |
Ed Carpenter Racing |
21 |
Takuma Sato |
1:10.7675 |
1.4995 |
10 |
15 |
100.114 |
Honda |
P |
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
22 |
Max Chilton |
1:10.7844 |
1.5164 |
17 |
17 |
100.090 |
Chevy |
P |
Carlin |
23 |
Conor Daly |
1:10.9036 |
1.6356 |
10 |
17 |
99.922 |
Chevy |
P |
Ed Carpenter Racing |
24 |
Charlie Kimball |
1:11.0619 |
1.7939 |
16 |
16 |
99.699 |
Chevy |
P |
AJ Foyt Enterprises |
25 |
Callum Ilott |
1:11.1181 |
1.8501 |
22 |
22 |
99.620 |
Chevy |
P |
Juncos Hollinger Racing |
26 |
Oliver Askew |
1:11.2253 |
1.9573 |
6 |
8 |
99.470 |
Honda |
P |
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
27 |
Jimmie Johnson |
1:11.4371 |
2.1691 |
20 |
20 |
99.175 |
Honda |
P |
Chip Ganassi Racing |
28 |
Dalton Kellett |
1:11.7969 |
2.5289 |
16 |
18 |
98.678 |
Chevy |
Po |
AJ Foyt Enterprises |
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