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Power leads first practice at Barber

IndyCar points leader Will Power picked up where he left off in testing by going fastest in the opening practice session for the championship's first race at Barber Motorsports Park in Alabama

Power, who won both the opening rounds of the season in Sao Paulo and St Petersburg and was also quickest in winter testing at Barber, led the way with a lap of 1m11.7886s approaching the final quarter of the session.

His Penske team-mate Ryan Briscoe moved up to second shortly afterwards, with early pacesetter Justin Wilson ending up third for Dreyer & Reinbold.

Ganassi's Dario Franchitti and Scott Dixon took fourth and sixth, split by Marco Andretti (Andretti Autosport). Hideki Mutoh (Newman/Haas/Lanigan) was a frontrunner throughout and was ultimately seventh in the standings, followed by Penske's Helio Castroneves, Andretti's Tony Kanaan and KV's Takuma Sato.

The session was stopped twice, first to retrieve Mario Romancini (Conquest) from the Turn 2 gravel and Castroneves from the Turn 8 run-off, and then when KV's EJ Viso went off at Turn 14 a minute from the end, prompting a slightly early chequered flag.

Practice one also marked Formula Renault 3.5 champion Bertrand Baguette's first official session as an IndyCar driver in Conquest's newly-added second entry. He played himself in with 23rd place, 2.2s off the pace.

Pos  Driver               Team                    Time        Gap
 1.  Will Power           Penske                  1m11.7886s
 2.  Ryan Briscoe         Penske                  1m12.0899s  + 0.3013s
 3.  Justin Wilson        Dreyer & Reinbold       1m12.1043s  + 0.3158s
 4.  Dario Franchitti     Ganassi                 1m12.1508s  + 0.3622s
 5.  Marco Andretti       Andretti                1m12.2866s  + 0.4980s
 6.  Scott Dixon          Ganassi                 1m12.3061s  + 0.5175s
 7.  Hideki Mutoh         Newman/Haas/Lanigan     1m12.4637s  + 0.6751s
 8.  Helio Castroneves    Penske                  1m12.5398s  + 0.7512s
 9.  Tony Kanaan          Andretti                1m12.7481s  + 0.9596s
10.  Takuma Sato          KV                      1m12.7660s  + 0.9774s
11.  Alex Lloyd           Dale Coyne              1m12.7779s  + 0.9893s
12.  Mike Conway          Dreyer & Reinbold       1m12.8887s  + 1.1001s
13.  Simona de Silvestro  HVM                     1m13.0896s  + 1.3011s
14.  Mario Romancini      Conquest                1m13.1358s  + 1.3472s
15.  EJ Viso              KV                      1m13.1389s  + 1.3503s
16.  Vitor Meira          Foyt                    1m13.1757s  + 1.3872s
17.  Raphael Matos        Luczo Dragon de Ferran  1m13.2338s  + 1.4452s
18.  Ryan Hunter-Reay     Andretti                1m13.2830s  + 1.4944s
19.  Dan Wheldon          Panther                 1m13.5407s  + 1.7521s
20.  Graham Rahal         Sarah Fisher            1m13.7309s  + 1.9423s
21.  Danica Patrick       Andretti                1m13.7554s  + 1.9669s
22.  Alex Tagliani        Fazzt                   1m13.9016s  + 2.1130s
23.  Bertrand Baguette    Conquest                1m14.0456s  + 2.2571s
24.  Mario Moraes         KV                      1m14.0532s  + 2.2646s
25.  Milka Duno           Dale Coyne              1m16.3448s  + 4.5563s

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