INDIANAPOLIS — Despite turning the third-fewest laps in Tuesday’s (May 12) practice for the 110th Indianapolis 500, Alex Palou stood alone on top of the speed chart at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
The defending Indianapolis 500 champion turned a fastest lap of 225.937 mph in the No. 10 Chip Ganassi Racing (CGR) Honda on his 24th lap of the day. That lap was turned after the car spent over an hour and a half in the CGR garage area after Palou complained of an issue. On his first flying lap after getting the car looked over, the four-time NTT IndyCar Series Champion dropped the proverbial hammer on the field.
Second fastest was Marcus Armstrong in the No. 66 Meyer Shank Racing Honda, just .042 mph slower than the Spaniard. Conor Daly was the third fastest in the No. 23 Dreyer and Reinbold Racing Chevrolet.
Daly turned 89 laps in the Indy-only entry, tying Christian Rasmussen for the second-highest number of laps completed. The Noblesville, IN native was very pleased with his car’s handling.
“We kind of got through our plan of running through three sets of tires,” Daly said. “I mean, that’s kind of what you’re limited to per day if we have good weather, so that’s why it kind of gets a little quiet, I would say, from time to time. But yeah, our car is fast. It just feels really good. So just kind of driving around and working through a few small things, and yeah, just tuning to kind of what I want and evaluating a few other things.
“But yeah, just a good day one. Obviously, the test was good too, but this whole process is you can get swept up in it. You can get behind, and you can get a little messy.”
On the non-tow speed chart for drivers completing laps without the assistance of a car breaking the air in front of them for about 10 seconds, Kyle Kirkwood was fastest on that sheet with a fast lap of 222.062 mph in the No. 27 Andretti Global Honda.
“It was good. Yeah, I mean, we got through the test items that we wanted to get through, just like I’m sure everybody did out there,” Kirkwood said. “You never really know what people are doing in the first couple of days of running around here. Once we get to Thursday, we kind of know everybody is doing some quality stuff before we have Fast Friday, but today went well.
“I think relative pace and speed compared to last year is up for us, which is a positive. Also did a little bit of race running. I was happy for the time that I had.”
Will Power in the No. 26 Honda made it an Andretti Global 1-2 with his fastest non-tow lap of 221.455 mph ahead of Jack Harvey in the No. 24 Dreyer and Reinbold Racing Chevrolet.
All 33 drivers practiced, and they completed 1,996 laps without incident. The only yellow flags were for track inspections.
Wednesday (May 13) practice begins at noon ET and will end at 6:00 p.m. ET.
Christopher DeHarde has covered IndyCar racing and the Road to Indy for various outlets since 2014. In addition to open wheel racing, DeHarde has also covered IMSA and various short track racing events around Indiana. Originally from New Orleans, DeHarde moved to the Indianapolis area in 2017 to further pursue a career as a motorsports writer.