Portland IndyCar: Palou leads Castroneves in first practice
Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda’s Alex Palou set the fastest lap of the 75-minute practice session at Portland International Raceway, the only track time before qualifying.
Photo by: Gavin Baker / LAT Images
Despite an off at the final corner that brought out one of three red flags mid-session, the Spanish sophomore clocked a 58.7824sec lap on alternate tires that sent him to the top of the times by one-tenth of a second.
Next up were Helio Castroneves and Jack Harvey of Meyer Shank Racing-Honda, with championship leader fourth for Arrow McLaren SP-Chevrolet.
Another title contender, Josef Newgarden was fifth ahead of Romain Grosjean of Dale Coyne Racing with RWR-Honda.
Unusually, 2019 Portland winner Will Power set his fastest time on primary tires to go seventh fastest ahead of Andretti Autosport-Honda pairing Alexander Rossi and Colton Herta.
Scott Dixon was 11th for Ganassi, less than two-hundredths behind the fastest of the Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing-Hondas, that of Graham Rahal.
As he practices for only his third start this year, Oliver Askew was 16th in the #45 RLL entry, but Takuma Sato’s engine let go on his third lap and so the two-time Indy 500 winner didn’t set a representative lap.
Scott McLaughlin suffered an off at the final corner late in the session that brought out the red flag but he finished the session 12th, while Max Chilton of Carlin was the other driver who halted the session with a spin-and-stall.
Jimmie Johnson was a very impressive 20th fastest, just 0.673sec from top time, while IndyCar debutant Callum Ilott was 24th of 27 cars in his Juncos Hollinger Chevrolet, 1.135sec from the pace, but didn’t set a time on the Firestone alternate compounds.
Qualifying begins at 12.15pm local (Pacific) time, while there will be a second practice of 30mins at 3.15pm.
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