Subscribe

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Motorsport prime

Discover premium content
Subscribe

Edition

USA
Practice report

Sonoma IndyCar: Newgarden stays top in FP2 qualifying sim

Josef Newgarden is looking strong for tomorrow’s qualifying session after topping the speed charts when all cars tried the softer-compound Firestones in this afternoon’s qualifying session.

Josef Newgarden, Team Penske Chevrolet

Josef Newgarden, Team Penske Chevrolet

Phillip Abbott / Motorsport Images

The championship leader lapped the 2.385-mile road course in 1min16.2485sec – under the official track record – to set an average speed of 112.605mph, once he switched to the red-sidewall tires. That put him a mere 0.0386 ahead of last year’s polesitter and defending IndyCar champion teammate Simon Pagenaud, as Helio Castroneves and Will Power were a further 0.1 and 0.2sec behind.

Fastest Honda accolade went to Ryan Hunter-Reay in the #28 Andretti Autosport entry, encouragingly just 0.23 off Newgarden’s pace, and one tenth ahead of the Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda of Scott Dixon. The four-time champion comes into this race just three points behind Newgarden.

Marco Andretti, Alexander Rossi and Takuma Sato made sure all four Andretti cars were in the Top 10, while Graham Rahal – who finished second here last year – was 10th.

Jack Harvey, making his second roadcourse IndyCar start this weeknd, was 0.8sec off Schmidt Peterson Motorsports-Honda teammate James Hinchcliffe, while IndyCar debutant Zachary Claman DeMelo was 1.3sec behind Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing-Honda teammate Graham Rahal. That was a respectable result in his first encounter with red tires. 

Sonoma, IndyCar FP2

ClaDriverLapsTimeGapIntervalMph
1 2 united_states  Josef Newgarden  11 1'16.2485     112.605
2 1 france  Simon Pagenaud  11 1'16.2871 0.0386 0.0386 112.549
3 3 brazil  Helio Castroneves  8 1'16.3471 0.0986 0.0600 112.460
4 12 australia  Will Power  11 1'16.4389 0.1904 0.0918 112.325
5 28 united_states  Ryan Hunter-Reay  9 1'16.4829 0.2344 0.0440 112.260
6 9 new_zealand  Scott Dixon  10 1'16.5863 0.3378 0.1034 112.109
7 27 united_states  Marco Andretti  10 1'16.5999 0.3514 0.0136 112.089
8 98 united_states  Alexander Rossi  11 1'16.6725 0.4240 0.0726 111.983
9 26 japan  Takuma Sato  13 1'16.7542 0.5057 0.0817 111.864
10 15 united_states  Graham Rahal  11 1'16.8121 0.5636 0.0579 111.779
11 10 brazil  Tony Kanaan  11 1'16.8291 0.5806 0.0170 111.755
12 18 france  Sébastien Bourdais  12 1'16.9746 0.7261 0.1455 111.543
13 83 united_states  Charlie Kimball  17 1'17.0106 0.7621 0.0360 111.491
14 8 united_kingdom  Max Chilton  11 1'17.0545 0.8060 0.0439 111.428
15 5 canada  James Hinchcliffe  9 1'17.1716 0.9231 0.1171 111.259
16 20 united_states  Spencer Pigot  12 1'17.2615 1.0130 0.0899 111.129
17 19 united_arab_emirates  Ed Jones  12 1'17.2681 1.0196 0.0066 111.120
18 21 united_states  J.R. Hildebrand  20 1'17.3791 1.1306 0.1110 110.960
19 4 united_states  Conor Daly  15 1'17.4156 1.1671 0.0365 110.908
20 14 colombia  Carlos Munoz  13 1'17.6810 1.4325 0.2654 110.529
21 7 united_kingdom  Jack Harvey  14 1'17.9880 1.7395 0.3070 110.094
22 13 canada  Zachary Claman DeMelo  16 1'18.0604 1.8119 0.0724 109.992

Be part of Motorsport community

Join the conversation
Previous article Carpenter on Pigot’s progress and the search for a new driver
Next article Jones “close” to new contract with Coyne

Top Comments

There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Motorsport prime

Discover premium content
Subscribe

Edition

USA