Portland IndyCar: Palou tops practice as Ilott debuts

Despite an off at the final corner that brought out one of three red flags mid-session, Spanish sophomore Palou headed the field with a 58.782s lap on the red-walled soft compound Firestone tyres to go 0.102s faster than Castroneves.

The Brazilian veteran, making only his fourth appearance of the season for Meyer Shank Racing ahead of his full-time return to the series next year with MSR, narrowly pipped outgoing team-mate Jack Harvey by 0.004s in the only track time before qualifying later today.

Championship leader Patricio O'Ward took fourth for Arrow McLaren SP-Chevrolet, 0.110s down on Palou's effort, while double series champion Josef Newgarden was the best of the Penske contingent in fifth.

Ex-Formula 1 driver Romain Grosjean was the best rookie in sixth with his Dale Coyne Racing with RWR machine, pipping 2019 Portland winner Will Power who set his fastest time on the hard compound primary tyres to go seventh fastest.

The Andretti Autosport team-mates Alexander Rossi and Colton Herta and Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing driver Graham Rahal completed the top 10, easing reigning champion Scott Dixon (Ganassi) down to P11.

Team Penske rookie Scott McLaughlin suffered an off at the final corner late in the session that brought out the red flag but he finished the session 12th, while Max Chilton of Carlin was the other driver who halted the session with a spin-and-stall.

Callum Ilott, Juncos Racing

Photo by: James Black

Making his first start for the RLL team, taking over the team's third car most recently driven on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course by Formula 2 regular Christian Lundgaard, 2019 Indy Lights champion Oliver Askew set the 16th fastest time.

RLL team-mate Takuma Sato suffered a problem with his Honda engine on his third lap, which prevented the two-time Indy 500 winner from setting a representative lap.

NASCAR legend Jimmie Johnson was a very impressive 20th fastest on his first visit to Portland, finishing just 0.673s from team-mate Palou's benchmark time, outpacing IndyCar debutant Callum Ilott.

The Ferrari F1 test driver finished 24th as his Juncos Hollinger team returned to IndyCar competition for the first time since the 2019 Indy 500.

Ilott's best effort was 1.135s from Palou's pace, but the Briton didn’t set a time on the Firestone 'red' compound.

Practice resumes following qualifying with an additional 90-minute session.

IndyCar Portland Practice 1 Result 

Cla	Driver	Team	Laps	Time	Gap	Mph
1	Alex Palou	Chip Ganassi Racing	33	58.782		120.281
2	Helio Castroneves	Meyer Shank Racing	32	58.885	0.102	120.071
3	Jack Harvey	Meyer Shank Racing	27	58.888	0.106	120.064
4	Patricio O'Ward	Arrow McLaren SP	33	58.893	0.110	120.054
5	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske	34	58.894	0.112	120.052
6	Romain Grosjean	Dale Coyne Racing	37	58.905	0.123	120.030
7	Will Power	Team Penske	33	58.919	0.137	120.000
8	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	32	58.932	0.150	119.975
9	Colton Herta	Andretti Autosport	33	58.947	0.164	119.944
10	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	32	58.991	0.209	119.855
11	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	33	59.008	0.225	119.820
12	Scott McLaughlin	Team Penske	31	59.066	0.284	119.702
13	Felix Rosenqvist	Arrow McLaren SP	31	59.109	0.327	119.615
14	Marcus Ericsson	Chip Ganassi Racing	32	59.118	0.335	119.598
15	Sébastien Bourdais	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	29	59.291	0.508	119.249
16	Oliver Askew	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	33	59.298	0.515	119.235
17	Rinus van Kalmthout	Ed Carpenter Racing	34	59.309	0.527	119.212
18	James Hinchcliffe	Andretti Autosport	25	59.312	0.530	119.206
19	Ed Jones	Dale Coyne Racing	31	59.338	0.555	119.154
20	Jimmie Johnson	Chip Ganassi Racing	36	59.455	0.673	118.919
21	Conor Daly	Ed Carpenter Racing	32	59.536	0.754	118.757
22	Max Chilton	Carlin	33	59.584	0.801	118.662
23	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske	33	59.680	0.898	118.471
24	Callum Ilott	Juncos Hollinger Racing	35	59.917	1.135	118.002
25	Dalton Kellett	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	42	1'00.198	1.416	117.451
26	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	11	1'00.269	1.487	117.312
27	Takuma Sato	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	3	1'22.252	23.469	85.960
View full results