Defending Indianapolis 500 winner Josef Newgarden led the rain-shortened open test at Indianapolis (Photo: Matt Fraver | Penske Entertainment).
SPEEDWAY, Ind. — The road to the 108th Indianapolis 500 began the same way last year’s race concluded. Josef Newgarden led the headlines with his tow speed of 228.811 mph from the morning session on a rain shortened Wednesday.
Being the top guy during the Open Test has become common ground for the reigning Indy 500 champion in recent memory at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Newgarden’s top tow speed sticks out as he was the only driver to surpass the 226 mph mark.
Despite rain ending the session just after 4 p.m. ET, Newgarden explained how comfortable he was driving the No. 2 Team Penske Chevrolet as he looks to become the first driver since Helio Castroneves from 2001-02 to win back-to-back Indy 500s.
“It was a good day. It’s great to be back at the track. Glad we got some laps. A little unsure about things looking at the weather beforehand, but really comfy to start out. I think good signs going into the month of May,” said Newgarden.
“Excited to come back here with Team Chevy and everybody at Team Penske. I think we’ll have a good package to fight with. We’re ultimately going to be looking for more speed than last year, which I think will help us on race day. I feel confident we can find that in qualifying trim and be one step better than we were in 2023.”
Behind Newgarden was the other headliner of Wednesday’s test, that being none other than Indy 500 rookie and 2021 NASCAR Cup Series champion Kyle Larson. In his much anticipated bid for the Memorial Day 1100 doubleheader, Larson’s No. 17 Arrow McLaren Chevrolet topped at 226.384 mph which bested the rookie class and temporary teammates.
Larson’s takeaway from Wednesday was how well his car handled in traffic until his last run of the day where his car leaned towards the tighter side. With one session in the books, the man leading the NASCAR Cup Series regular season standings hopes to run with bigger packs to learn even more how his No. 17 machine handles that’ll benefit him as the Month of May looms closer.
“It felt good. Just good to get laps and get in some traffic, and to visually see what that looked like, to feel the runs and the dirty air a little bit. I feel like I learned quite a bit there and still have a lot to learn,” said Larson. “By yourself, (the car) has a lot of grip. In traffic, it was good. The first time I got in traffic, the balance felt normal. I didn’t feel like I went into a big transition from clean air to dirty air, but the last time I was super tight. It was good to experience to feel what that felt like.
“The packs I’ve been in have only had two or three cars, but it’ll be way different when the field is out there. I’ve just got to keep getting laps, and as the packs keep getting bigger, I think I’ll learn a lot more.”
Larson hopes to become the first driver since Kurt Busch in 2014 to attempt “The Double” with the goal of equaling Tony Stewart’s 2001 feat and successfully complete all 1,100 miles on May 26th.
Rain altered Kyle Larson’s full experience at Indianapolis (Photo: Joe Skibinski | Penske Entertainment).
Any chance of more track time ended once the rain arrived after all cars were allowed to run at the 2.5-mile circuit. In the brief session, Colton Herta’s speed of 225.907 mph was the fastest of the short afternoon session.
Before the rain arrived, Graham Rahal was leading a five-car pack around IMS before the yellow flag came out. For the Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing veteran, he’s looking to bounce back from a horrendous 2023 Indy 500 after failing to qualify in his No. 15 Honda last year before replacing the injured Stefan Wilson.
Although 19th fastest with a top speed of 222.366 mph, Rahal was happy with the team’s morning efforts which was the opposite a year ago where he and his RLL teammates were towards the bottom of the speed charts.
“It was a good first morning, I guess, of time on track. We were pretty focused on just running by ourselves, trying to get a good understanding of what is different from last year to this year, see if we felt that we had found the speed that was expected,” Rahal explained.
“We kind of had three different specifications of cars running around today, and I’m sure there’s more to be coming, at least within our team. But I thought it was a positive morning. The car felt good. Chassis balance was really nice to drive, so the changes that were made there in the off-season I think were a positive,” Rahal continued.
“I wish we had time, like most, to get into race running because I really wanted to see before May what do we have, what are we going to come back with in that regard, but also understanding how well the car pulls up and sucks up and tows because that’s where we really, really struggled the last few years. So that being said, all on our own it feels good and the pacing seemed decent, so let’s see.”
All eyes on the 108th Indy 500 with the race being over a month away (Photo: James Black | Penske Entertainment).
While Herta led the Honda camp in the brief afternoon session, it was Scott Dixon’s morning tow speed of 226.346 mph that led the manufacture, good enough to be third overall Wednesday. Dixon looks to capture a long elusive second Indy 500 win of his legendary career.
Behind Dixon was last year’s Indy 500 pole sitter and current INDYCAR championship leader Alex Palou, the last driver to reach the 226+ mph barrier with 226.201 mph being his best speed. Rounding out the top-five was Herta’s top speed from the afternoon run.
Weather permitting, drivers will have six hours to log laps and make any improvements on their cars as it will be the last time drivers will have time to run the famed oval until Tuesday, May 14. Coverage of Thursday’s Open Test begins at 10 a.m. ET on Peacock with the session slated to conclude at 4 p.m. ET.
