The 2017 Verizon IndyCar Series season is in its 13th race with the Honda Indy 200. Who looked solid early on in the second practice session?
Andretti Autosport’s Ryan Hunter-Reay topped this weekend’s second IndyCar practice session at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in Lexington, Ohio with a top lap time of 64.2961 seconds (126.428 miles per hour) around the 13-turn, 2.258-mile natural terrain road course.
From 1st through 7th place in the session, the drivers switched from Honda to Chevrolet each position, with Hunter-Reay topping everybody in his Honda car. The fastest driver of a Chevrolet car was Josef Newgarden, who was 2nd fastest in the practice session.
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Scott Dixon (Honda), Simon Pagenaud (Chevrolet), Alexander Rossi (Honda), Will Power (Chevrolet) and Marco Andretti (Honda) continued this Honda-Chevrolet pattern, respectively. Graham Rahal, who was 8th fastest in the practice session, was the first to deviate from this pattern in his Honda car.
Chevrolet drivers, specifically Team Penske drivers, took four of the top 9 spots on the speed chart. But aside of the top 4 Team Penske Chevrolet drivers, the next highest driver of a Chevrolet car was Spencer Pigot, who was 16th fastest in the practice session, as Honda drivers took 11 of the top 15 spots.
The series lone full-time rookie, Ed Jones, was 12th quickest in his Dale Coyne Racing Honda. Jones’ rookie teammate Esteban Gutierrez finished 19th quickest in the practice session. Mikhail Aleshin, who is making his return for Schmidt Peterson Motorsports, finished 13th quickest in the practice session in his Honda car. Full practice results are located at IndyCar.com.
Remaining Weekend Schedule
The third practice session takes place tomorrow morning at 9:55 AM ET before qualifying starts at 2:05 PM ET. Qualifying will be broadcast live on NBC Sports Network (NBCSN) starting at 2:00 PM ET.
Morning warm-up for the race will take place on Sunday, July 30th at 11:15 AM ET. The race itself starts at 3:40 PM ET on Sunday and can be seen live on CNBC starting at 3:00 PM ET. It can also be seen on a delay at 7:00 PM ET on NBCSN.
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