Pagenaud quickest in final practice

Simon Pagenaud topped the timing screens in Saturday’s final IndyCar practice session ahead of qualifying at Long Beach.

The Frenchman went to the top late in the session with a best lap of 1m08.0960s, just edging out former Champ Car team-mate Will Power by 0.0076 seconds.

The margin between the Schmidt and Penske drivers was representative of how tight the times were right though the field, with 18 drivers dipping under Ryan Briscoe’s 1m08.6089s pole time from last year.

Power’s best time came after he had earlier triggered the first red flag of the morning when he lost the rear on his way into Turn 11, a mistake that ended with his car hitting the barriers and sustaining a broken rear wing.

The only other interruption of the morning was also Penske-based, this time coming at the hands of Helio Castroneves.

The Brazilian spun to a halt at Turn 5, but was able to get himself back to the pits under reds and resumed running shortly after the session restarted.

Mike Conway’s good start to the weekend continued as he set the third-best lap of the morning.

The Rahal Letterman Lanigan driver was just ahead of reigning champion Ryan Hunter-Reay, who had led the times through the middle phase of the session.

Pos  Driver               Team/Car                   Time        Gap
  1.  Simon Pagenaud       Schmidt Dallara-Honda      1m08.0960s
  2.  Will Power           Penske Dallara-Chevy       1m08.1036s  + 0.0076s
  3.  Mike Conway          Rahal Dallara-Honda        1m08.1112s  + 0.0152s
  4.  Ryan Hunter-Reay     Andretti Dallara-Chevy     1m08.1790s  + 0.0830s
  5.  Graham Rahal         Rahal Dallara-Honda        1m08.1803s  + 0.0843s
  6.  Dario Franchitti     Ganassi Dallara-Honda      1m08.2051s  + 0.1091s
  7.  Charlie Kimball      Ganassi Dallara-Honda      1m08.2715s  + 0.1755s
  8.  AJ Allmendinger      Penske Dallara-Chevy       1m08.2781s  + 0.1821s
  9.  Simona de Silvestro  KV Dallara-Chevy           1m08.3420s  + 0.2460s
 10.  Helio Castroneves    Penske Dallara-Chevy       1m08.3593s  + 0.2633s
 11.  Tony Kanaan          KV Dallara-Chevy           1m08.3615s  + 0.2655s
 12.  JR Hildebrand        Panther Dallara-Chevy      1m08.4587s  + 0.3627s
 13.  Marco Andretti       Andretti Dallara-Chevy     1m08.4967s  + 0.4007s
 14.  Tristan Vautier      Schmidt Dallara-Honda      1m08.5013s  + 0.4053s
 15.  Sebastien Bourdais   Dragon Dallara-Chevy       1m08.5238s  + 0.4278s
 16.  Oriol Servia         Panther/DRR Dallara-Chevy  1m08.5285s  + 0.4325s
 17.  Takuma Sato          Foyt Dallara-Honda         1m08.5539s  + 0.4579s
 18.  James Jakes          Rahal Dallara-Honda        1m08.5922s  + 0.4962s
 19.  James Hinchcliffe    Andretti Dallara-Chevy     1m08.6139s  + 0.5179s
 20.  Josef Newgarden      Fisher Dallara-Honda       1m08.6347s  + 0.5387s
 21.  Alex Tagliani        Herta Dallara-Honda        1m08.6781s  + 0.5821s
 22.  Scott Dixon          Ganassi Dallara-Honda      1m08.8232s  + 0.7272s
 23.  EJ Viso              Andretti Dallara-Chevy     1m08.8762s  + 0.7802s
 24.  Justin Wilson        Coyne Dallara-Honda        1m09.0592s  + 0.9632s
 25.  Sebastian Saavedra   Dragon Dallara-Chevy       1m09.3640s  + 1.2680s
 26.  Ed Carpenter         Carpenter Dallara-Chevy    1m09.4512s  + 1.3552s
 27.  Ana Beatriz          Coyne Dallara-Honda        1m09.6140s  + 1.5180s
 

Source: http://www.iracing.com/inracingnews/real-world-racing/indycar-news/indycar/pagenaud-quickest-in-final-practice

Kevin Paul Lepage William Ashton Lewis Jr Sterling Burton Marlin Mark Anthony Martin Jeremy Allan Mayfield