Nashville IndyCar: Herta leads FP1, O’Ward and Daly shunt

Sebastien Bourdais, Colton Herta, Alex Rossi and Graham Rahal were the first drivers to duck under the 80sec barrier, with Jack Harvey soon joining them.

Rossi’s Andretti Autosport-Honda then went down to a 1min18.8551sec, while Herta and Pato O’Ward were discussing bumps knocking the steering-wheel out of their hands and causing them blurred vision.

That didn’t stop the pair of them from vaulting Rossi in the times, Herta landing a 1min18.2899sec, but then O’Ward’s Arrow McLaren SP-Chevy clipped the inside wall at Turn 3 which spat him into the outside wall, busting the front suspension on both sides. Out came the red flag with 52mins of the 75min session remaining.

“I got caught out by that inside wall and it sent me off there,” said O’Ward. “The damage doesn't seem to be too bad. We'll be ready to go tomorrow, we'll see what we've got for qualifying."

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Action resumed with just under 45mins remaining, and Scott McLaughlin swiftly slotted his #2 Penske-Chevy into second spot, while Felix Rosenqvist rose to fourth in the second AMSP entry and then first with a time 0.3sec clear of the opposition.

Then Alex Palou, Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda’s points leader closed that deficit to 0.1762sec with second fastest, Team Penske-Chevrolet’s Will Power split them, and then Romain Grosjean took hit the top spot with his Dale Coyne Racing with RWR-Honda. His lap of 1min17.9511sec was a mere 0.0444sec faster than Rosenqvist, and equated to an average of 96.984mph around this 2.17-mile track.

Herta was the next driver to lead, with an impressive 1min17.6726, some 0.28sec faster than Grosjean, who then shaved that gap to 0.18sec. With 20mins to go, Dixon who’d had a quiet session hitherto, appeared in sixth with his 15^th lap – albeit 0.6sec off the top – while fellow Kiwi McLaughlin and Power moved into second and third.

Herta kept stroking out his lead, the first driver to duck under 1min17 – and by some margin. With under 10mins to go, he was almost 0.6sec faster than teammate Rossi who then slid down an escape road after going second fastest. Dixon also got under 1min17 to grab second ahead of Grosjean.

Then Conor Daly slid sideways into the tires at Turn 9 with under five minutes to go and embedded the #20 Ed Carpenter Racing-Chevrolet deep enough in the tire wall to end the session early.

That left Herta on top, 0.3778sec ahead of Dixon with Grosjean a further 0.1652sec adrift. Marcus Ericsson and Palou ensured three Ganassi cars in the top six, while Rosenqvist, Power, McLaughlin and Simon Pagenaud were the top four Chevrolet drivers.

Local hero Newgarden was 12^th in the fourth Penske-Chevrolet, while reigning and four-time Indy 500 winner Helio Castroneves was 20^th in his first road/street course IndyCar race of the year, about 1sec off Meyer Shank Racing-Honda teammate Jack Harvey.

Jimmie Johnson was 3.3sec off the ultimate pace, but ahead of Max Chilton’s Carlin-Chevy, Santino Ferrucci (Rahal Letterman Lanigan-Honda) and Cody Ware (third Coyne entry).

Dalton Kellett ran only an installation lap before the AJ Foyt Racing crew discovered an electrical gremlin in the #4 car.