Power on top in morning practice

The Penske driver waited until the final moments of the morning to put in a 1m11.410s lap to take the top spot from Andretti Autosport's Ryan Hunter-Reay.

Scott Dixon grabbed third for Ganassi, with Justin Wilson in fourth. The Dreyer & Reinbold man had been quickest in the opening 45 minutes - reserved for rookies and drivers outside the top 10 - and stayed on top for a long time even when the championship leaders came out.

Ryan Briscoe caused the first yellow of the weekend when he spun into the tyres after 20 minutes. He was able to make his own way back to the pits, and Penske had him back on track with a new rear wing within 10 minutes. He went on to take fifth, ahead of Andretti's Mike Conway.

Alex Tagliani was briefly fastest for Sam Schmidt Motorsports amid a late flurry of quick laps and position changes. He was pushed back to seventh by the flag.

Helio Castroneves (Penske), Graham Rahal (Ganassi) and Tony Kanaan (KV) completed the top 10.

Returnee Paul Tracy was in the top 10 for a while for Dragon Racing but ended the session in 15th.

Drivers having early issues included Dale Coyne Racing's James Jakes and Dreyer & Reinbold's Ana Beatriz, who both had incidents, and James Hinchcliffe, who had a small fire on his Newman/Haas car.

Pos  Driver               Team               Time        Gap
 1.  Will Power           Penske             1m11.4103s
 2.  Ryan Hunter-Reay     Andretti           1m11.6005s  + 0.1902s
 3.  Scott Dixon          Ganassi            1m11.6602s  + 0.2499s
 4.  Justin Wilson        Dreyer & Reinbold  1m11.7195s  + 0.3092s
 5.  Ryan Briscoe         Penske             1m11.7818s  + 0.3715s
 6.  Mike Conway          Andretti           1m11.8074s  + 0.3971s
 7.  Alex Tagliani        Sam Schmidt        1m11.9158s  + 0.5055s
 8.  Helio Castroneves    Penske             1m11.9559s  + 0.5456s
 9.  Graham Rahal         Ganassi            1m11.9668s  + 0.5565s
10.  Tony Kanaan          KV                 1m11.9816s  + 0.5713s
11.  Dario Franchitti     Ganassi            1m11.9940s  + 0.5837s
12.  Sebastien Bourdais   Dale Coyne         1m12.1376s  + 0.7273s
13.  EJ Viso              KV                 1m12.1992s  + 0.7889s
14.  Oriol Servia         Newman/Haas        1m12.2053s  + 0.7950s
15.  Paul Tracy           Dragon             1m12.2651s  + 0.8548s
16.  Raphael Matos        AFS                1m12.3876s  + 0.9773s
17.  Takuma Sato          KV                 1m12.5953s  + 1.1850s
18.  Marco Andretti       Andretti           1m12.6416s  + 1.2313s
19.  Charlie Kimball      Ganassi            1m12.6621s  + 1.2518s
20.  JR Hildebrand        Panther            1m12.7030s  + 1.2927s
21.  Vitor Meira          Foyt               1m12.7415s  + 1.3312s
22.  Simona de Silvestro  HVM                1m12.9980s  + 1.5877s
23.  Sebastian Saavedra   Conquest           1m13.1309s  + 1.7206s
24.  James Hinchcliffe    Newman/Haas        1m13.4436s  + 2.0333s
25.  Danica Patrick       Andretti           1m13.5479s  + 2.1376s
26.  James Jakes          Dale Coyne         1m13.6652s  + 2.2549s
27.  Ana Beatriz          Dreyer & Reinbold  1m14.7272s  + 3.3169s