IndyCar Long Beach: O’Ward’s McLaren fastest from Dixon in FP1

The Andretti Autosport cars set the early pace, with Romain Grosjean and then Colton Herta taking turns at the top, before Ganassi's 2021 champion Alex Palou deposed Herta to claim top spot with 1m07.2416s.

Then Marcus Ericsson demoted team-mate Palou from P1 with a 1m07.2233s, while 2022 Long Beach winner Josef Newgarden slotted into fifth. Not long after, however, the two-time champion smacked his Penske broadside against the wall exiting Turn 5, damaging both left-side wheels and even the edge of the floor.

Graham Rahal also had a spin at Turn 5 but touched the wall only with his rear wing endfence and returned to action.

Just past the halfway point in the session, Chevrolet’s representation suddenly looked stronger, as Scott McLaughlin moved his Penske entry into fourth, just ahead of O’Ward. Then out came the red flag, as Helio Castroneves stalled his Meyer Shank Racing car when he failed to find reverse gear after sliding to a halt at the exit of the final hairpin. At the same time, Agustin Canapino slid down the Turn 9 escape road and also needed rescuing.

O’Ward went up the Turn 9 escape road with 18 minutes to go, after locking his right front wheel over the bumps while Newgarden, with a taped up floor, returned to the track and jumped into sixth.

Grosjean slotted into top spot with 10 minutes remaining, the St. Petersburg polesitter logging a 1m07.104s to jump Ericsson by 0.118s.

Herta also clambered past Ericsson before then claiming top spot, chipping 0.124s from Grosjean’s former benchmark. 

Ericsson got within 0.005s of Herta before O’Ward's sparkling 1m06.6999 put him 0.28s faster than Herta.

Patricio O'Ward, Arrow McLaren Chevrolet

Photo by: Gavin Baker / Motorsport Images

Saving his best to last, Dixon grabbed second but was still 0.265s off O’Ward. After Herta and Ericsson,   Alexander Rossi made it two Arrow McLarens in the top five.

He was followed by Grosjean, Palou and the impressive Callum Ilott (Juncos Holinger), as the third McLaren of Felix Rosenqvist and leading RLL driver Christian Lundgaard completed the top 10.

Second practice is at 8.45am local (Pacific) time on Saturday.

IndyCar Long Beach FP1 Results

Cla	Driver	Team	Time	Gap
1	Patricio O'Ward	Arrow McLaren	1'06.6999
2	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'06.9649	0.2650
3	Colton Herta	Andretti Autosport	1'06.9808	0.2809
4	Marcus Ericsson	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'06.9859	0.2860
5	Alexander Rossi	Arrow McLaren	1'07.0104	0.3105
6	Romain Grosjean	Andretti Autosport	1'07.1049	0.4050
7	Alex Palou	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'07.1515	0.4516
8	Callum Ilott	Juncos Hollinger Racing	1'07.2467	0.5468
9	Felix Rosenqvist	Arrow McLaren	1'07.3135	0.6136
10	Christian Lundgaard	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	1'07.3237	0.6238
11	Kyle Kirkwood	Andretti Autosport	1'07.3355	0.6356
12	Jack Harvey	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	1'07.3864	0.6865
13	Scott McLaughlin	Team Penske	1'07.3973	0.6974
14	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske	1'07.4273	0.7274
15	Will Power	Team Penske	1'07.4420	0.7421
16	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	1'07.4785	0.7786
17	David Malukas	Dale Coyne Racing	1'07.5242	0.8243
18	Simon Pagenaud	Meyer Shank Racing	1'07.5308	0.8309
19	Marcus Armstrong	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'07.5392	0.8393
20	Conor Daly	Ed Carpenter Racing	1'07.5978	0.8979
21	Devlin DeFrancesco	Andretti Autosport	1'07.6755	0.9756
22	Rinus van Kalmthout	Ed Carpenter Racing	1'07.7257	1.0258
23	Agustin Canapino	Juncos Hollinger Racing	1'07.8087	1.1088
24	Helio Castroneves	Meyer Shank Racing	1'07.9204	1.2205
25	Ray Robb	Dale Coyne Racing	1'08.2600	1.5601
26	Santino Ferrucci	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	1'08.9570	2.2571
27	Benjamin Pedersen	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	1'09.0446	2.3447
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