Indy 2: Penskes stay top

Teams became further acclimatised to the IRL IndyCar Series' new engine/chassis changes during the second day of a two-day test at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and the progress was reflected in the numbers. Hornish had the fastest lap of the day - 220.113mph - a few ticks faster than his chart-topping lap of 219.271mph during Wednesday's session.

"Another week at the shop and we should be in really good shape for opening day next weekend," Hornish said. "Everything went really well during both days of testing. Each change we made seemed to make the car a little bit faster."

Castroneves, Hornish's team-mate with Team Penske, also broke the 220mph barrier, hitting 220.075mph in the final minutes of Thursday's practice. It was the second time in as many days that both Penske cars topped the field.

"Now we can keep focusing on the work ahead of us and not worry about what the other people are doing," Castroneves said. "Now we can be the hunted instead of the hunter. It's good for our focus, but it's bad because the other guys now have us as a reference. They're going to be working twice as hard."

The closest drivers to the Penske cars included Scott Dixon, who hit 219.985mph on the morning session, and Tomas Scheckter, who led Chevrolet's resurgence with a 219.125mph in the afternoon session. Dixon said he and his Target Chip Ganassi crew weren't pressing the issue during the two-day test.

"We've been very casual the last couple of days," Dixon said. "We haven't trimmed the car out much. We've been very comfortable. We got what we needed out of this, so now we'll move on and wait for the month to begin. It's so far away; there's no point in trying to do too much."

The gap between Toyota, Chevy and Honda narrowed during Thursday's practice, as Honda broke into the top five with Dan Wheldon's 218.953mph during the afternoon session. In Wednesday's test, there'd been no Honda in the top 10. Chevy continued its strong showing, including the surprising speed of Felipe Giaffone and Robby Gordon.

Giaffone, in only his second day in the Dreyer & Reinbold Dallara/Chevy vacated by the retiring Robbie Buhl, had the sixth-fastest lap among the 26 drivers. Gordon, Wednesday's surprise at third-quickest, was ninth-fastest on Thursday in his Chevy-Dallara.

Honda, testing without Tony Kanaan, who opted for a later test at Texas Motor Speedway, put three cars (Wheldon's, Kosuke Matsuura's and Roger Yasukawa's) among the top eight on Thursday.

Drivers, engineers and mechanics are working to get used to the changes that will be implemented for the 500. Engine displacement has been reduced from 3.5-litres to 3.0, and a variety of aerodynamic changes have been made to the chassis, including reverse wicker on the rear wing and a vertical centreline wicker designed to keep the cars from becoming airborne when they spin.

The morning session got off to a rough start, with three drivers crashing in the first hour and Alex Barron crashing moments before the lunch break. The afternoon session was completed without incident.

Eight minutes after the green flag for the morning session, Buddy Rice's car struck the wall in turn one. Rice was not injured, but the Rahal/Letterman Racing Honda-powered Panoz G Force sustained right-side damage.

"I just made a mistake," Rice said. "I just got in there and it stepped out. It's my own fault."

Forty-five minutes later, Darren Manning spun and hit the wall in one with the car's left rear. The force of the hit was measured at 40 Gs, but Manning was not injured.

"I got up to speed a little bit too fast," Manning said. "It was really good going into one, but as soon as I got halfway through, it snapped sideways on me. Nearly isn't good enough, but I nearly did catch it."

Later in the morning session, Barron's car appeared to break, sending him hard into the wall in turn two.

"Something mechanical happened," said Barron, who wasn't hurt. "Something happened in the rear of the car, But we're not sure what it is yet. They're looking at the tapes, so we'll see if we can figure out what it can be. It was a pretty good hit - 45 Gs."

Of the other Brits, Mark Taylor continued to make solid prtogress, moving up to 217.245mph, which made him 12th. Dario Franchitti is still struggling though - 19th fastest on 215.652mph. "It has been frustrating," admitted Andretti Green Racing's Scottish driver, who is thankful that there will be plenty of tracktime available in May. "We are slowly getting there with the car, but we still are battling some issues."

The opening day of practice for the 88th running of the 500 will be May 9, with pole qualifying scheduled for May 15, and the race is slated for May 30.

Sam Hornish Dallara/Toyota 220.113mph
Helio Castroneves Dallara/Toyota 220.075mph
Scott Dixon G-Force/Toyota 219.985mph
Tomas Scheckter Dallara/Chevrolet 219.125mph
Dan Wheldon Dallara/Honda 218.953mph
Felipe Giaffone Dallara/Chevrolet 218.830mph
Kosuke Matsuura G-Force/Honda 218.510mph
Roger Yasukawa G-Force/Honda 217.953mph
Robby Gordon Dallara/Chevrolet 217.860mph
Alex Barron Dallara/Chevrolet 217.510mph