Yesterday’s pacesetter McLaughlin wasted no time in flirting with the 1m06-second barrier, getting down to a 1m07.0036s on his third lap and then broke through it with a 1m06.7282s on his fifth lap.
With 36 minutes to go, his nearest challenger became team-mate Newgarden, just 0.0053s behind, but Christian Lundgaard and Graham Rahal were an encouraging third and sixth for Rahal Letterman Lanigan.
Lundgaard proved that RLL’s strong showing was no fluke by bouncing back into third as the times tumbled, just 0.04s off McLaughlin’s benchmark, while Callum Ilott of Juncos Hollinger Racing jumped into sixth until he was bumped down by Long Beach winner of Kyle Kirkwood of Andretti Autosport and another Arrow McLaren’s Felix Rosenqvist.
Romain Grosjean, who lost most of yesterday’s session when his Honda expired, was able to climb to third spot, but that became fourth when Palou went fastest of all with a 1m06.6568s with 17 minutes to go, and then lowered the bar to 1m06.2781s – 0.45s ahead of McLaughlin – an average speed of 124.928mph.
Pato O’Ward got his McLaren into seventh, ahead of an impressive showing by Devlin DeFrancesco of Andretti, while his teammate Colton Herta made a great save at Turn 14 to pop into fifth. He trimmed his time further to scramble into second – but still four tenths away from Palou’s benchmark.
Newgarden and McLaughlin improved with less than a dozen minutes left to go 0.23s and 0.26s respectively behind Palou.
Josef Newgarden, Team Penske Chevrolet Romain Grosjean, Andretti Autosport Honda
Photo by: Michael L. Levitt / Motorsport Images
Dixon reappeared in the top five with less than five minutes to go, 0.33s from team-mate Palou, but any further chance of improvements were curtailed by Helio Castroneves spinning his Meyer Shank Racing entry on the exit of Turn 9. That caused a red flag which became the chequered flag to end the session prematurely.
IndyCar Barber – FP2 results
|
P |
Name |
FTime |
Diff |
FL |
Laps |
FSpeed |
Engine |
Tire |
Team |
|
1 |
Alex Palou |
1:06.2781 |
1:06.2781 |
16 |
20 |
124.928 |
Honda |
P |
Chip Ganassi Racing |
|
2 |
Josef Newgarden |
1:06.5133 |
0.2352 |
14 |
19 |
124.486 |
Chevy |
P |
Team Penske |
|
3 |
Scott McLaughlin |
1:06.5386 |
0.2605 |
14 |
19 |
124.439 |
Chevy |
P |
Team Penske |
|
4 |
Scott Dixon |
1:06.6090 |
0.3309 |
19 |
20 |
124.308 |
Honda |
P |
Chip Ganassi Racing |
|
5 |
Colton Herta |
1:06.6788 |
0.4007 |
16 |
20 |
124.177 |
Honda |
P |
Andretti Autosport w/Curb-Agajanian |
|
6 |
Romain Grosjean |
1:06.7455 |
0.4674 |
14 |
23 |
124.053 |
Honda |
P |
Andretti Autosport |
|
7 |
Christian Lundgaard |
1:06.7711 |
0.4930 |
8 |
18 |
124.006 |
Honda |
P |
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
|
8 |
Alexander Rossi |
1:06.7808 |
0.5027 |
9 |
20 |
123.988 |
Chevy |
P |
Arrow McLaren |
|
9 |
Pato O’Ward |
1:06.8323 |
0.5542 |
14 |
21 |
123.892 |
Chevy |
P |
Arrow McLaren |
|
10 |
Marcus Ericsson |
1:06.8654 |
0.5873 |
14 |
21 |
123.831 |
Honda |
P |
Chip Ganassi Racing |
|
11 |
Devlin DeFrancesco |
1:06.8754 |
0.5973 |
14 |
20 |
123.812 |
Honda |
P |
Andretti Steinbrenner Autosport |
|
12 |
Kyle Kirkwood |
1:06.9333 |
0.6552 |
10 |
22 |
123.705 |
Honda |
P |
Andretti Autosport |
|
13 |
Felix Rosenqvist |
1:06.9628 |
0.6847 |
9 |
19 |
123.651 |
Chevy |
P |
Arrow McLaren |
|
14 |
Callum Ilott |
1:06.9705 |
0.6924 |
9 |
22 |
123.637 |
Chevy |
P |
Juncos Hollinger Racing |
|
15 |
Marcus Armstrong |
1:06.9972 |
0.7191 |
6 |
23 |
123.587 |
Honda |
P |
Chip Ganassi Racing |
|
16 |
Graham Rahal |
1:07.0372 |
0.7591 |
20 |
23 |
123.514 |
Honda |
P |
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
|
17 |
Will Power |
1:07.0377 |
0.7596 |
16 |
22 |
123.513 |
Chevy |
P |
Team Penske |
|
18 |
David Malukas |
1:07.1437 |
0.8656 |
8 |
20 |
123.318 |
Honda |
P |
Dale Coyne Racing with HMD |
|
19 |
Simon Pagenaud |
1:07.1458 |
0.8677 |
9 |
23 |
123.314 |
Honda |
P |
Meyer Shank Racing |
|
20 |
Rinus VeeKay |
1:07.1799 |
0.9018 |
12 |
19 |
123.251 |
Chevy |
P |
Ed Carpenter Racing |
|
21 |
Jack Harvey |
1:07.2494 |
0.9713 |
7 |
21 |
123.124 |
Honda |
P |
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
|
22 |
Helio Castroneves |
1:07.3324 |
1.0543 |
9 |
18 |
122.972 |
Honda |
P |
Meyer Shank Racing |
|
23 |
Conor Daly |
1:07.3750 |
1.0969 |
15 |
21 |
122.894 |
Chevy |
P |
Ed Carpenter Racing |
|
24 |
Sting Ray Robb |
1:07.5094 |
1.2313 |
21 |
22 |
122.650 |
Honda |
P |
Dale Coyne Racing w/RWR |
|
25 |
Santino Ferrucci |
1:07.5188 |
1.2407 |
7 |
15 |
122.633 |
Chevy |
P |
AJ Foyt Enterprises |
|
26 |
Benjamin Pedersen |
1:07.8030 |
1.5249 |
21 |
22 |
122.118 |
Chevy |
P |
AJ Foyt Enterprises |
|
27 |
Agustin Canapino |
1:07.8443 |
1.5662 |
22 |
22 |
122.044 |
Chevy |
P |
Juncos Holling Racing |