Herta leads 17-car IndyCar test at Sebring

With the major caveat that some drivers tried push-to-pass boost while others did not, Herta’s lap time of 51.85sec, set on the 67^th of 78 laps this afternoon, was just 0.01sec faster than Malukas in the Dale Coyne Racing-Honda around the 1.7-mile short course. Herta had finished the morning in fifth with a 52.409 but as the track rubbered in he moved into P1, while Malukas took a full second off his morning time to slot into P2.

Herta’s teammate Romain Grosjean was 0.17sec off top spot in third, after setting a near identical time in the afternoon as he had in the morning, when it was good enough for top spot.

The Team Penske-Chevrolet pairing of former champions Josef Newgarden and Will Power were fourth and fifth, separated by 0.15sec, while Graham Rahal led the Rahal Letterman Lanigan-Honda contingent in sixth. His two new teammates Jack Harvey and Christian Lundgaard were separated by a mere hundredth, and only about one tenth off Rahal.

Felix Rosenqvist, who endured such a difficult 2021 season, his first with Arrow McLaren SP-Chevy, was seventh fastest as he embarks on a year with Craig Hampson as his race engineer. He turned more laps this afternoon than any other driver, racking up 104.

Alexander Rossi was eighth for Andretti ahead of Scott McLaughlin in the third Penske, while Kyle Kirkwood of AJ Foyt Racing-Chevy edged former Indy Lights teammate and fellow rookie Devlin DeFrancesco in the #29 car.

Felix Rosenqvist , Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet

Photo by: IndyCar

Pato O’Ward could not replicate his morning time and thus his AMSP entry slipped down to 14^th ahead of Callum Ilott’s Juncos Hollinger Racing-Chevy.

In her first IndyCar group test, Tatiana Calderon of Foyt was only 0.7sec from top spot.

Kevin Magnussen turned 143 laps, whittling his way down to a 52.84sec effort in the #10 Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda. It was decided last Friday the four full-time Ganassi IndyCar drivers – Alex Palou, Scott Dixon, Marcus Ericsson and Jimmie Johnson – will test tomorrow (Tuesday).

The Foyt team will stay on for Tuesday, adding Dalton Kellett alongside Kirkwood and Calderon, while fellow Chevy entrant Juncos Hollinger will also run Ilott again.

Coyne will have two cars on track, as two-time Indy 500 winner Takuma Sato will get his first test day with the team and his first day with veteran race engineer Don Bricker, to test alongside Malukas.

Meyer Shank Racing-Honda will have both Helio Castroneves and Simon Pagenaud at their services, while Ed Carpenter Racing-Chevrolet’s two full-timers Rinus VeeKay and Conor Daly will also be in action.