Mid-Ohio IndyCar: Ganassi's Dixon fastest in opening practice

Dixon set a time of 1m04.449s, with Team Penske's Will Power in second place, 0.1188 seconds slower than the reigning champion.

Chip Ganassi Racing to split with sponsor Target

Juan Pablo Montoya was third and Dixon's team-mate Tony Kanaan was fourth.

Helio Castroneves made it three Penske drivers in the top five with fifth place, ahead of James Hinchcliffe.

The best of the Honda-powered runners, Hinchcliffe engaged in a sharp exchange of words with ninth-placed Sebastien Bourdais at the end of the session.

Championship leader Simon Pagenaud only managed seventh and Josef Newgarden was eighth, just ahead of Bourdais.

Andretti Autosport's Ryan Hunter-Reay was also noticeably absent from the frontrunners and ended practice in 10th, 0.4568s off the pace set by Dixon.

Turn 2 seemed to be causing issues for many drivers with a reported oil spill in the later part of the session.

Both Power and Conor Daly experienced offs there - the latter bringing out a red flag with just 15 minutes to go, but the session was restarted.

PRACTICE RESULTS:

Pos	Driver	Team	Car	Time	Gap	Laps
1	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	Dallara/Chevrolet	1m04.4491s	-	23
2	Will Power	Team Penske	Dallara/Chevrolet	1m04.5679s	0.1188s	31
3	Juan Pablo Montoya	Team Penske	Dallara/Chevrolet	1m04.6034s	0.1543s	27
4	Tony Kanaan	Chip Ganassi Racing	Dallara/Chevrolet	1m04.6387s	0.1896s	21
5	Helio Castroneves	Team Penske	Dallara/Chevrolet	1m04.7217s	0.2726s	24
6	James Hinchcliffe	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	Dallara/Honda	1m04.7559s	0.3068s	28
7	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske	Dallara/Chevrolet	1m04.7712s	0.3221s	28
8	Josef Newgarden	Ed Carpenter Racing	Dallara/Chevrolet	1m04.8258s	0.3767s	27
9	Sebastien Bourdais	KVSH Racing	Dallara/Chevrolet	1m04.8662s	0.4171s	25
10	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	Dallara/Honda	1m04.9059s	0.4568s	24
11	Charlie Kimball	Chip Ganassi Racing	Dallara/Chevrolet	1m04.9208s	0.4717s	25
12	Marco Andretti	Andretti Autosport	Dallara/Honda	1m05.0988s	0.6497s	23
13	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan	Dallara/Honda	1m05.1285s	0.6794s	25
14	Carlos Munoz	Andretti Autosport	Dallara/Honda	1m05.1752s	0.7261s	28
15	Conor Daly	Dale Coyne Racing	Dallara/Honda	1m05.2710s	0.8219s	22
16	Takuma Sato	AJ Foyt Enterprises	Dallara/Honda	1m05.2977s	0.8486s	23
17	Mikhail Aleshin	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	Dallara/Honda	1m05.3099s	0.8608s	29
18	Spencer Pigot	Ed Carpenter Racing	Dallara/Chevrolet	1m05.3134s	0.8643s	25
19	Jack Hawksworth	AJ Foyt Enterprises	Dallara/Honda	1m05.5073s	1.0582s	25
20	Max Chilton	Chip Ganassi Racing	Dallara/Chevrolet	1m05.5526s	1.1035s	27
21	R.C. Enerson	Dale Coyne Racing	Dallara/Honda	1m05.5533s	1.1042s	31
22	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Herta	Dallara/Honda	1m05.7503s	1.3012s	30