Andretti fastest in Mid-Ohio practice
Marco Andretti surged to the top of the order in the final seconds of Friday practice for the Mid-Ohio IRL IndyCar Series race
The Andretti Green driver lapped in 1:07.9102 right at the end of afternoon practice, as the field dashed out for a final three-minute sprint following a stoppage to clear up AJ Foyt IV's crashed car.
"Practice wasn't bad because we were the fastest of the day, but there is still some stuff that we need to work on," said Andretti. "We still have a lot of understeer in the car."
Until Andretti's late improvement, it had been his AGR teammate Tony Kanaan who looked set to end Friday practice fastest of all.
The Brazilian had topped the morning session with a 1:08.0301, beating compatriot Helio Castroneves (Penske) by just 0.043 seconds, and with temperatures rising in the afternoon, it had appeared unlikely that anyone would topple Kanaan until Andretti's eleventh hour effort.
Castroneves was second again in the afternoon, ahead of his Penske teammate Ryan Briscoe, who had been fastest for the majority of second practice. Kanaan dropped back to fourth in session two, with championship leader Scott Dixon (Ganassi) completing the top five having been third in the morning.
EJ Viso and HVM Racing made a spectacular return from last week's mumps scare to take sixth in second practice, although the best of the former Champ Car contenders on combined times was Newman/Haas/Lanigan's Justin Wilson, who was fourth in the morning despite a scary moment when he inadvertently clipped chief mechanic Tim Coffeen during a practice pit stop.
"The pit boxes are really, really short, and I tried different lines coming into the boxes, and one time I came in I clipped Tim's knee with the front wing and knocked him over," said Wilson.
"It's not a nice thing to have happen to him. I felt really bad and am glad he is okay and was back on his feet and working on the car by the end of the session."
Fellow 'transition' squad KV Racing - who had been very strong on the road and street courses so far this year - had a difficult day though, with Will Power's morning 17th place their best result.
Buddy Rice continued his recent strong run for the small Dreyer & Reinbold team, setting the seventh quickest time in both sessions.
Most drivers enjoyed a trouble-free opening day, although both Mario Moraes (Dale Coyne Racing) and Foyt IV (Vision Racing) went off at Turn 9 in the afternoon. While Moraes did some underside damage in the gravel trap but stopped short of the wall, Foyt made it all the way to the barriers and did significant damage to the right hand side of his Dallara-Honda.
Practice one: Pos Driver Team Time 1. Tony Kanaan Andretti Green 1:08.0301 2. Helio Castroneves Penske 1:08.0731 + 0.0430 3. Scott Dixon Ganassi 1:08.2328 + 0.2027 4. Justin Wilson Newman Haas Lanigan 1:08.2432 + 0.2131 5. Ryan Briscoe Penske 1:08.4379 + 0.4078 6. Hideki Mutoh Andretti Green 1:08.4521 + 0.4220 7. Buddy Rice Dreyer & Reinbold 1:08.5086 + 0.4785 8. Marco Andretti Andretti Green 1:08.5232 + 0.4931 9. Vitor Meira Panther Racing 1:08.6261 + 0.5960 10. Dan Wheldon Ganassi 1:08.6627 + 0.6326 11. Graham Rahal Newman Haas Lanigan 1:08.7469 + 0.7168 12. EJ Viso HVM 1:08.7936 + 0.7635 13. Danica Patrick Andretti Green 1:08.8195 + 0.7894 14. Mario Dominguez Pacific Coast 1:08.8923 + 0.8622 15. Ryan Hunter-Reay Rahal Letterman 1:08.9726 + 0.9425 16. Darren Manning Foyt 1:09.2187 + 1.1886 17. Will Power KV 1:09.4833 + 1.4532 18. AJ Foyt IV Vision 1:09.5358 + 1.5057 19. Oriol Servia KV 1:09.7735 + 1.7434 20. Bruno Junqueira Dale Coyne 1:09.8298 + 1.7997 21. Enrique Bernoldi Conquest 1:09.9583 + 1.9282 22. Ed Carpenter Vision 1:10.0606 + 2.0305 23. Jaime Camara Conquest 1:10.7799 + 2.7498 24. Mario Moraes Dale Coyne 1:10.8747 + 2.8446 25. Marty Roth Roth 1:12.1395 + 4.1094 26. Milka Duno Dreyer & Reinbold 1:13.3922 + 5.3621
Practice two: Pos Driver Team Time 1. Marco Andretti Andretti Green 1:07.9102 2. Helio Castroneves Penske 1:08.1181 + 0.2079 3. Ryan Briscoe Penske 1:08.2268 + 0.3166 4. Tony Kanaan Andretti Green 1:08.3840 + 0.4738 5. Scott Dixon Ganassi 1:08.5034 + 0.5932 6. EJ Viso HVM 1:08.5253 + 0.6151 7. Buddy Rice Dreyer & Reinbold 1:08.6047 + 0.6945 8. Danica Patrick Andretti Green 1:08.6065 + 0.6963 9. Graham Rahal Newman/Haas/Lanigan 1:08.6614 + 0.7512 10. Ryan Hunter-Reay Rahal Letterman 1:08.8302 + 0.9200 11. Darren Manning Foyt 1:08.9897 + 1.0795 12. Vitor Meira Panther 1:09.0104 + 1.1002 13. Dan Wheldon Ganassi 1:09.1057 + 1.1955 14. Justin Wilson Newman/Haas/Lanigan 1:09.1298 + 1.2196 15. Hideki Mutoh Andretti Green 1:09.2789 + 1.3687 16. Bruno Junqueira Dale Coyne 1:09.4189 + 1.5087 17. Mario Dominguez Pacific Coast 1:09.5531 + 1.6429 18. Will Power KV 1:09.5642 + 1.6540 19. Oriol Servia KV 1:09.6515 + 1.7413 20. Enrique Bernoldi Conquest 1:09.6637 + 1.7535 21. AJ Foyt IV Vision 1:09.8296 + 1.9194 22. Jaime Camara Conquest 1:10.1800 + 2.2698 23. Ed Carpenter Vision 1:10.2246 + 2.3144 24. Mario Moraes Dale Coyne 1:10.3337 + 2.4235 25. Milka Duno Dreyer & Reinbold 1:13.0378 + 5.1276 26. Marty Roth Roth 1:13.1352 + 5.2250
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