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Autosport
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David Malsher-Lopez

IndyCar Laguna Seca: Palou leads second practice from Rossi

Colton Herta had worked down to a 1m12.9450s in his Andretti Herta Autosport, when Graham Rahal spun his Rahal Letterman Lanigan exiting the top of the Corkscrew and stalled, causing a red flag.

Juncos Hollinger Racing’s rookie Callum Ilott delivered a 1m12.34s, then a 1m11.9899s to go top ahead of fellow rookies David Malukas and Christian Lundgaard. As in Portland, Ilott was shining at a track where he gained experience last year, and he was over three-tenths of a second clear of his nearest rival at the time.

The first of the Team Penske drivers to set a representative lap was Scott McLaughlin, who set a 1m12.6457s on his first flyer.

On the exit of Turn 9, Pato O’Ward got slightly sideways in his Arrow McLaren SP, but then got irredeemably sideways approaching Turn 10 and skated backward over the gravel and required rescuing.

The session resumed with 24mins remaining, and Romain Grosjean moved his Andretti Autosport-Honda up to second, halving Ilott’s advantage, but with 13 minutes to go, Alexander Rossi shaded Ilott’s time by a mere 0.0086s, and then out came several drivers on fresh rubber and the order started shuffling.

Palou of Chip Ganassi Racing, who topped a test here two weeks ago, claimed top spot with a 1m11.6510s effort – three-tenths quicker than Rossi. While Rossi then improved, so too did Palou, getting down to 1m11.3847s.

Josef Newgarden, Team Penske Chevrolet (Photo by: Michael L. Levitt / Motorsport Images)

Colton Herta moved up to third, 0.15s behind team-mate Rossi and now ahead of rookie Rookie of the Year contender Christian Lundgaard of RLL and Simon Pagenaud.

With their final efforts Team Penske's title battlers Will Power and Josef Newgarden moved up to third and fourth.

IndyCar Laguna Seca - FP2 results

Cla Driver Team Laps Time Gap Mph
1 Spain Alex Palou United States Chip Ganassi Racing 23 1'11.3847   112.865
2 United States Alexander Rossi United States Andretti Autosport 20 1'11.6920 0.3073 112.381
3 Australia Will Power United States Team Penske 13 1'11.7183 0.3336 112.340
4 United States Josef Newgarden United States Team Penske 19 1'11.7973 0.4126 112.216
5 United States Colton Herta United States Andretti Autosport 17 1'11.8497 0.4650 112.134
6 New Zealand Scott Dixon United States Chip Ganassi Racing 17 1'11.9192 0.5345 112.026
7 Denmark Christian Lundgaard United States Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing 22 1'11.9463 0.5616 111.984
8 France Simon Pagenaud United States Meyer Shank Racing 16 1'11.9514 0.5667 111.976
9 United Kingdom Callum Ilott United States Juncos Hollinger Racing 18 1'11.9899 0.6052 111.916
10 United States David Malukas United States Dale Coyne Racing 21 1'12.1029 0.7182 111.740
11 France Romain Grosjean United States Andretti Autosport 21 1'12.1568 0.7721 111.657
12 United Kingdom Jack Harvey United States Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing 19 1'12.3024 0.9177 111.432
13 Canada Devlin DeFrancesco United States Andretti Autosport 20 1'12.3337 0.9490 111.384
14 United States Graham Rahal United States Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing 18 1'12.3532 0.9685 111.354
15 Brazil Helio Castroneves United States Meyer Shank Racing 20 1'12.4744 1.0897 111.168
16 United States Kyle Kirkwood United States A.J. Foyt Enterprises 23 1'12.5186 1.1339 111.100
17 Netherlands Rinus van Kalmthout United States Ed Carpenter Racing 19 1'12.6215 1.2368 110.942
18 New Zealand Scott McLaughlin United States Team Penske 21 1'12.6457 1.2610 110.905
19 Sweden Felix Rosenqvist United States Arrow McLaren SP 17 1'12.6659 1.2812 110.875
20 Sweden Marcus Ericsson United States Chip Ganassi Racing 15 1'12.7757 1.3910 110.707
21 Japan Takuma Sato United States Dale Coyne Racing 22 1'12.8304 1.4457 110.624
22 United States Conor Daly United States Ed Carpenter Racing 17 1'12.8597 1.4750 110.580
23 Canada Dalton Kellett United States A.J. Foyt Enterprises 29 1'12.9890 1.6043 110.384
24 United States Jimmie Johnson United States Chip Ganassi Racing 21 1'13.2065 1.8218 110.056
25 Switzerland Simona de Silvestro Paretta Autosport 21 1'13.3861 2.0014 109.786
26 Mexico Patricio O'Ward United States Arrow McLaren SP 9 1'13.7735 2.3888 109.210

 

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