Indy 500: Sato puts Coyne on top on Day 1, Jimmie Johnson third

Sato ran only four laps in the morning’s two hour session, unhappy with the aero balance of his car, but come the afternoon, he shone. On his 63^rd of 64 laps, the 2017 and 2020 Indy winner got a strong tow from several cars and lapped the 2.5-mile oval in 39.3118sec, an average speed of 228.939mph.

Despite his best effort receiving tow assists, he actually made up most of his speed on the opposition in the Turns, since his trap speeds were ‘only’ between 4^th and 5^th fastest.

His teammate, rookie David Malukas, was seventh fastest with his best lap coming in his 35^th of 80 laps driving the Coyne w/ HMD machine.

This morning’s pacesetter Scott Dixon was second fastest on a very promising day for Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda, in which all five Ganassi entries finished in the top nine, with NASCAR legend but IndyCar rookie Jimmie Johnson clocking third fastest time ahead of Marcus Ericsson fourth, Alex Palou sixth and Tony Kanaan ninth.

No less encouraging was that four of the Ganassi cars lay between third and eighth on the no-tow charts.

The top two no-tow speeds came from Ed Carpenter Racing-Chevrolets of Rinus VeeKay who was fifth overall, and the team owner Ed Carpenter who was only 29^th overall.

Josef Newgarden was quickest of the Team Penske-Chevrolets in eighth, while the fastest Andretti Autosport-Honda driver was the 2020 polesitter, Marco Andretti, a hair quicker than rookie teammate Devlin DeFrancesco.

P	No	Name	FTime	Diff	FL	Laps	FSpeed	Engine	Team
1	51	Takuma Sato	39.3118	39.3118	63	64	228.939	Honda	Dale Coyne Racing w/RWR
2	9	Scott Dixon	39.5139	0.2021	1	50	227.768	Honda	Chip Ganassi Racing
3	48	Jimmie Johnson	39.5219	0.2101	77	79	227.722	Honda	Chip Ganassi Racing
4	8	Marcus Ericsson	39.6311	0.3193	36	73	227.094	Honda	Chip Ganassi Racing
5	21	Rinus VeeKay	39.6484	0.3366	67	76	226.995	Chevy	Ed Carpenter Racing
6	10	Alex Palou	39.6523	0.3405	45	68	226.973	Honda	Chip Ganassi Racing
7	18	David Malukas	39.7443	0.4325	35	80	226.448	Honda	Dale Coyne Racing with HMD
8	2	Josef Newgarden	39.7583	0.4465	53	76	226.368	Chevy	Team Penske
9	1	Tony Kanaan	39.7716	0.4598	40	47	226.292	Honda	Chip Ganassi Racing
10	98	Marco Andretti	39.8080	0.4962	12	85	226.085	Honda	Andretti Herta Autosport w/ Marco & Curb
11	29	Devlin DeFrancesco	39.8363	0.5245	60	82	225.925	Honda	Andretti Steinbrenner Autosport
12	60	Simon Pagenaud	39.8411	0.5293	74	95	225.897	Honda	Meyer Shank Racing
13	4	Dalton Kellett	39.8520	0.5402	73	97	225.836	Chevy	AJ Foyt Enterprises
14	11	JR Hildebrand	39.8560	0.5442	60	79	225.813	Chevy	AJ Foyt Enterprises
15	7	Felix Rosenqvist	39.8655	0.5537	3	77	225.759	Chevy	Arrow McLaren SP
16	12	Will Power	39.9234	0.6116	36	73	225.432	Chevy	Team Penske
17	15	Graham Rahal	39.9917	0.6799	62	72	225.047	Honda	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing
18	06	Helio Castroneves	40.0128	0.7010	37	98	224.928	Honda	Meyer Shank Racing
19	77	Callum Ilott	40.0133	0.7015	52	56	224.925	Chevy	Juncos Hollinger Racing
20	45	Jack Harvey	40.0157	0.7039	78	91	224.912	Honda	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing
21	14	Kyle Kirkwood	40.0526	0.7408	47	49	224.705	Chevy	AJ Foyt Enterprises
22	3	Scott McLaughlin	40.0566	0.7448	70	83	224.682	Chevy	Team Penske
23	24	Sage Karam	40.0595	0.7477	27	37	224.666	Chevy	Dreyer & Reinbold
24	5	Pato O'Ward	40.0967	0.7849	19	76	224.457	Chevy	Arrow McLaren SP
25	30	Christian Lundgaard	40.1232	0.8114	17	74	224.309	Honda	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing
26	26	Colton Herta	40.1259	0.8141	51	75	224.294	Honda	Andretti Autosport
27	27	Alexander Rossi	40.1399	0.8281	64	71	224.216	Honda	Andretti Autosport
28	20	Conor Daly	40.1520	0.8402	17	53	224.148	Chevy	Ed Carpenter Racing
29	33	Ed Carpenter	40.1583	0.8465	27	58	224.113	Chevy	Ed Carpenter Racing
30	6	Juan Pablo Montoya	40.1913	0.8795	11	37	223.929	Chevy	Arrow McLaren SP
31	28	Romain Grosjean	40.3705	1.0587	69	83	222.935	Honda	Andretti Autosport
32	25	Stefan Wilson	40.4983	1.1865	5	10	222.232	Chevy	DragonSpeed/Cusick Motorsports
33	23	Santino Ferrucci	40.6529	1.3411	17	20	221.386	Chevy	Dreyer & Reinbold