Toronto IndyCar: Rossi leads Pagenaud in opening practice

Palou was the first driver into the 61sec bracket, a 61.8398sec which he then trimmed to 61.4782, which equates to 104.583mph around the 1.786-mile course. Two-time Toronto pole-winner Will Power trimmed his advantage to 0.22sec, then delivered a 61.3240 to go top for Team Penske-Chevrolet.

His former teammate Simon Pagenaud, a master of the bumpy street course, got within 0.0758sec in his Meyer Shank Racing-Honda, before Andretti Autosport-Honda’s Alexander Rossi edged 0.0172sec ahead of Power to claim P1.

With 42mins left, Felix Rosenqvist vaulted into first for Arrow McLaren SP-Chevrolet, by just 0.0053sec, right before the red flag flew for an inspection of a drain cover at Turn 2.

Callum Ilott struck the wall at Turn 1 with his front-left corner 30mins after overcorrecting a slide, the subsequent second red flag coming moments after Graham Rahal – the 2009 polesitter here – sent his #15 Rahal Letterman Lanigan-Honda to the top. His 61.2189sec effort was the first lap over 105mph.

Soon after the session restarted, Jimmie Johnson spun his Carvana Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda while trying his softer Firestone alternate compound tires, and although he stalled, he had minimized damage to just his right-front wing.

AMR Safety Team’s recovery of the #48 was swift, and following the green flag, Palou hit the track with a set of Foalternates, and most drivers followed suit, for this was the only chance to try the alternates before tomorrow afternoon’s qualifying session.

Helio Castroneves of Meyer Shank was the first to make it count, moving into second place, while Scott McLaughlin who had zero experience of the track prior to this weekend landed fifth. Then Palou went fastest with a 61.1376sec lap, while teammate Scott Dixon slotted into second, 0.07sec adrift.

While teammate Pato O’Ward overshot Turn 1, Rosenqvist moved to the top with a 60.7936sec lap, but that was quickly shaded by Alexander Rossi (60.6090sec), Rahal, championship leader Marcus Ericsson and Josef Newgarden.

Pagenaud’s best flyer was a 60.6991sec, enough to put him second with 5mins to go, but then his teammate Castroneves and Dixon went off at Turn 8, the Ganassi driver skating straight on, spinning around and returning to the course, but the MSR car nosed into the tires and needed retrieval.

With too many people then hitting the track with 2mins to go, there wasn’t enough time for anyone to improve, so that Rossi emerged from the session on top ahead of Pagenaud, Rahal, Ericsson, Newgarden and Rosenqvist. This sextet was covered by a mere 0.1846sec.

Power had his best lap hindered inadvertently by Rossi, and wound up ninth, splitting Dixon and Palou – the latter being the best of the drivers who had never previously tried this track. Rahal’s teammate Christian Lundgaard was an impressive 11^th.

Cla	Driver	Team	Laps	Time	Gap	Mph
1	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	23	1'00.6090		106.083
2	Simon Pagenaud	Meyer Shank Racing	24	1'00.6991	0.0901	105.926
3	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	27	1'00.7031	0.0941	105.919
4	Marcus Ericsson	Chip Ganassi Racing	27	1'00.7262	0.1172	105.879
5	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske	29	1'00.7650	0.1560	105.811
6	Felix Rosenqvist	Arrow McLaren SP	23	1'00.7936	0.1846	105.761
7	Colton Herta	Andretti Autosport	24	1'00.8689	0.2599	105.630
8	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	24	1'00.9854	0.3764	105.429
9	Will Power	Team Penske	28	1'00.9932	0.3842	105.415
10	Alex Palou	Chip Ganassi Racing	33	1'01.0522	0.4432	105.313
11	Christian Lundgaard	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	31	1'01.1749	0.5659	105.102
12	Helio Castroneves	Meyer Shank Racing	19	1'01.2454	0.6364	104.981
13	Takuma Sato	Dale Coyne Racing	30	1'01.2604	0.6514	104.955
14	David Malukas	Dale Coyne Racing with HMD	25	1'01.2627	0.6537	104.951
15	Scott McLaughlin	Team Penske	31	1'01.3171	0.7081	104.858
16	Romain Grosjean	Andretti Autosport	30	1'01.3535	0.7445	104.796
17	Devlin DeFrancesco	Andretti Autosport	31	1'01.5252	0.9162	104.504
18	Jack Harvey	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	32	1'01.6580	1.0490	104.278
19	Rinus van Kalmthout	Ed Carpenter Racing	25	1'01.6766	1.0676	104.247
20	Patricio O'Ward	Arrow McLaren SP	26	1'01.6906	1.0816	104.223
21	Kyle Kirkwood	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	27	1'01.8350	1.2260	103.980
22	Conor Daly	Ed Carpenter Racing	25	1'02.1501	1.5411	103.453
23	Callum Ilott	Juncos Hollinger Racing	19	1'02.6874	2.0784	102.566
24	Jimmie Johnson	Chip Ganassi Racing	37	1'03.0238	2.4148	102.019
25	Dalton Kellett	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	29	1'03.0873	2.4783	101.916
View full results