Chevrolet powered Penske's Josef Newgarden topped the 1st practice session of the IndyCar Classic being held at COTA. Although, the session had to be stopped for 15 minutes, when Colton Herta's Harding Steinbrenner came to a halt after a Honda engine failure.
Newgarden set the pace initially and was followed soon afterwards by the rest. The St. Petersburg winner set a lap time of 1:48.657s. Colton Herta was a close 2nd before his engine gave up, as he lapped the circuit in 1:48.793s.
Alexander Rossi was next to line himself up in the 3rd spot, as he clocked a lap time of 1:49.045s. He was accompanied by his teammate, Ryan Hunter-Reay in 4th, as the two were 5 tenths apart.
As Graham Rahal finished the session 5th, with a lap time of 1:49.507s, both the Chip Ganassis of Felix Rosenqvist and defending champion, Scott Dixon were 6th and 9th respectively. The Honda powered Ganassi teammates were separated by the Penske duo of Simon Pagenaud and Will Power in 7th and 8th positions. The reigning Indy 500 winner recorded a lap time of 1:49.738s, which was 1.081s slower than the fastest time.
British driver Max Chilton rounded up the top 10, with him going as quick as 1:50.018s. Occupying 11th and 12th spots were the Schmidt Peterson Motorsports of Marcus Ericsson and James Hinchliffe.
Indy Lights champion, Patricio O'Ward marked his IndyCar debut, and made a last minute attempt to do a lap time of 1:50.489s, which ensured him no better than 16th position. At the bottom of the timesheets sat Ed Jones, who could only manage a lap time of 1:52.630s, a whopping almost 4 seconds slower than the pace setter.
All the drivers were given one flying lap at the end of the session to compensate for the 15 minutes of abruption, cause by Colton Herta. However, only 5 drivers attempted to improve their lap times in the end, and none was able to beat Newgarden to the top.
Practice 1 results:
The Practice 2 will begin on 01:00 AM (March 23rd) of Pakistan Standard Time and 03:00 PM EST (March 22nd).
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