Rahal sets pace in Mid-Ohio practice

The 22-year-old local driver's time of 1m09.603s was some way short of the expected pace (Will Power's pole lap last year was a 1m07.120s) and several drivers commented on the gripless nature of the dusty, unrubbered track. But Rahal's time was still nearly half a second quicker than next man up EJ Viso.

Rahal was lucky to be in a position to set that time at all, having had to take avoiding action when he encountered Tony Kanaan's KV Racing machine moving across the track on the back straight - the Ganassi car took to the grass momentarily.

Dario Franchitti, who moments before Rahal and Viso posted times had been fastest, was third quickest ahead of championship rival Will Power.

Justin Wilson meanwhile, who had been quickest for much of the session in newly-liveried Dreyer & Reinbold car, tumbled down the order to fifth in that final dash.

James Hinchcliffe was another to lose out in the final moments, having been up the sharp end right from the very beginning of the 75-minute session - which was restricted to just rookies and those outside the top ten in the standings for the first 45 minutes. He ended up an impressive sixth fastest in the fastest of the Newman/Haas cars.

Edmonton pole-sitter Takuma Sato was forced to sit out much of the session following an engine failure on his KV Racing machine, while Marco Andretti's car spent much of his session in the garage. Neither man figured in the times.

Other incidents included an off for Sebastian Saavedra at Turn 2 which saw him beach his Conquest car in the gravel and spin for Ryan Briscoe on entry to Turn 6.

Pos  Driver               Team               Time        Gap
 1.  Graham Rahal         Ganassi            1m09.6031s
 2.  EJ Viso              KV                 1m09.6522s  + 0.0491s
 3.  Dario Franchitti     Ganassi            1m09.6936s  + 0.0905s
 4.  Will Power           Penske             1m09.7198s  + 0.1167s
 5.  Justin Wilson        Dreyer & Reinbold  1m09.7912s  + 0.1881s
 6.  James Hinchcliffe    Newman/Haas        1m09.8138s  + 0.2107s
 7.  Scott Dixon          Ganassi            1m09.9713s  + 0.3682s
 8.  Ryan Hunter-Reay     Andretti           1m10.0505s  + 0.4474s
 9.  Ryan Briscoe         Penske             1m10.1394s  + 0.5363s
10.  Helio Castroneves    Penske             1m10.2027s  + 0.5996s
11.  Simona de Silvestro  HVM                1m10.3522s  + 0.7491s
12.  Vitor Meira          Foyt               1m10.3599s  + 0.7568s
13.  Tony Kanaan          KV                 1m10.3686s  + 0.7655s
14.  Alex Tagliani        Sam Schmidt        1m10.3718s  + 0.7687s
15.  James Jakes          Dale Coyne         1m10.4045s  + 0.8014s
16.  JR Hildebrand        Panther            1m10.5981s  + 0.9950s
17.  Sebastien Bourdais   Dale Coyne         1m10.7947s  + 1.1916s
18.  Charlie Kimball      Ganassi            1m11.0650s  + 1.4619s
19.  Martin Plowman       Sam Schmidt        1m11.1767s  + 1.5736s
20.  Mike Conway          Andretti           1m11.4336s  + 1.8305s
21.  Sebastian Saavedra   Conquest           1m11.5791s  + 1.9760s
22.  Danica Patrick       Andretti           1m11.6077s  + 2.0046s
23.  Oriol Servia         Newman/Haas        1m11.6317s  + 2.0286s
24.  Ana Beatriz          Dreyer & Reinbold  1m12.0141s  + 2.4110s
25.  Ed Carpenter         Sarah Fisher       1m13.4975s  + 3.8944s
26.  Marco Andretti       Andretti           1m14.1995s  + 4.5964s
27.  Takuma Sato          KV                 1m15.0390s  + 5.4359s