St Pete IndyCar: Dixon leads Hinchcliffe in third practice

Andretti Autosport-Honda’s Marco Andretti, Friday morning’s pacesetter, was first to shine, lapping the course in 62.5692sec on his fourth lap, but he was knocked off top spot by Dixon’s Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda, which was fastest yesterday afternoon. A minute later, the Team Penske Chevrolet of Will Power further demoted Andretti to third.

Dixon tumbled down the leaderboard as James Hinchcliffe (Schmidt Peterson Motorsports-Honda), Charlie Kimball (Ganassi), Alexander Rossi and Ryan Hunter-Reay (both Andretti) whittled away at their laptimes.

Then with 10 minutes to go, Dixon hit the top spot once more, lapping the 1.8-mile airport/street course in 61.6240sec, an average of 105.154mph.

Hinchcliffe and Rossi threw in late fliers to draw within a tenth of the four-time champion, with Dixon’s teammate Max Chilton showing an impressive turn of speed to take fourth, 0.124 sec behind Dixon who had brushed a wall while trying to further improve his time.

Sebastien Bourdais re-emphasized his impressive form from yesterday by finishing fifth in the Dale Coyne Racing-Honda, just 0.14 behind Dixon, with Josef Newgarden finishing the session as best of the Penske drivers – and best Chevrolet – in seventh, ahead of Hunter-Reay and Ganassi’s Tony Kanaan. Newgarden’s teammates Power, Simon Pagenaud and Helio Castroneves were 10^th, 11^th and 15^th respectively.