Colton Herta

IndyCar News: Herta tops opening practice, Rossi breaks thumb

Alexander Rossi will not be driving this weekend.  His crash in practice resulted in a broken right thumb.   Tony Kanaan might be taking his place but Arrow McLaren has not released who will be driving the No 7 entry yet.

“First of all, I’m very thankful for all the men and women on the INDYCAR medical team and for all the great work they do,” Rossi said after being examined and released at the INDYCAR Medical Unit. “I do have a broken right thumb.

“It’s unfortunate because the injury occurred when I almost made it around the corner and I didn’t want to give up on it, so I didn’t quite get my hands off the wheel in time. However, everyone seems optimistic about the kind of injury it is. We’re going to take the next steps here and get ready for Gateway.”

The team says it does not expect to have an update this evening on who will run the No. 7 the rest of this weekend. Will likely come ahead of Saturday morning’s practice that starts at 10:30am ET.

***********************************************************************************************

Andretti Global Driver Colton Herta turned a lap of 1m01.8906s to lead opening practice of the Ontario Honda Dealers Indy Toronto IndyCar car on the streets around Exhibition Place.

–by Mark Cipolloni–

Ganassi Honda driver Alex Palou was 2nd quick, 0.1898s behind Herta.

Former Ganassi driver Felix Rosenqvist was 3rd quick in his Meyer Shank Honda, 0.35s behind Herta.

Alex Palou’s Ganassi teammate Scott Dixon was 4th, 0.38s behind Herta while Alexander Rossi was the fastest Chevy driver in 5th before he wadded up his Arrow McLaren Chevy.

Andretti Global’s Marcus Ericsson lost his Honda engine early in the session.  Luckily it was only his third engine, so no grid penalty.

 

Image
Alexander Rossi in the wall

Alexander Rossi made contact with the tire barrier in Turn 9 during the Group 2 practice, resulting in a six minutes red flag.

Ganassi Racing’s Linus Lindqvist made a mistake and buried his car into the tire barrier in Turn 8 with seven minutes to go in the ten minute session.  The red flag resulted in a early end to the Group 2 session, leaving the drivers with about eight minutes of practice.

Rossi and Lindqvist were both seen and released by the INDYCAR Medical Unit.

Practice 1 Results

Rank

Car

Driver Name

Engine

Time

Speed

Diff

Gap

1

26

Herta, Colton

Honda

1m01.8906s

103.887

–.—-

–.—-

2

10

Palou, Alex

Honda

1m02.0804s

103.569

0.1898

0.1898

3

60

Rosenqvist, Felix

Honda

1m02.2467s

103.292

0.3561

0.1663

4

9

Dixon, Scott

Honda

1m02.2694s

103.255

0.3788

0.0227

5

7

Rossi, Alexander

Chevy

1m02.2747s

103.246

0.3841

0.0053

6

3

McLaughlin, Scott

Chevy

1m02.3324s

103.150

0.4418

0.0577

7

2

Newgarden, Josef

Chevy

1m02.3361s

103.144

0.4455

0.0037

8

27

Kirkwood, Kyle

Honda

1m02.4912s

102.888

0.6006

0.1551

9

21

VeeKay, Rinus

Chevy

1m02.4956s

102.881

0.6050

0.0044

10

12

Power, Will

Chevy

1m02.5581s

102.778

0.6675

0.0625

11

5

O’Ward, Pato

Chevy

1m02.5634s

102.769

0.6728

0.0053

12

45

Lundgaard, Christian

Honda

1m02.6594s

102.612

0.7688

0.0960

13

66

Malukas, David

Honda

1m02.7353s

102.488

0.8447

0.0759

14

15

Rahal, Graham

Honda

1m02.7857s

102.405

0.8951

0.0504

15

11

Armstrong, Marcus

Honda

1m02.8346s

102.326

0.9440

0.0489

16

20

Rasmussen, Christian (R)

Chevy

1m03.3285s

101.528

1.4379

0.4939

17

78

Canapino, Agustin

Chevy

1m03.3514s

101.491

1.4608

0.0229

18

77

Grosjean, Romain

Chevy

1m03.4827s

101.281

1.5921

0.1313

19

14

Ferrucci, Santino

Chevy

1m03.6225s

101.059

1.7319

0.1398

20

18

McElrea, Hunter (R)

Honda

1m03.8132s

100.757

1.9226

0.1907

21

28

Ericsson, Marcus

Honda

1m03.9540s

100.535

2.0634

0.1408

22

6

Siegel, Nolan (R)

Chevy

1m03.9797s

100.494

2.0891

0.0257

23

30

Fittipaldi, Pietro

Honda

1m04.0592s

100.370

2.1686

0.0795

24

8

Lundqvist, Linus (R)

Honda

1m04.0762s

100.343

2.1856

0.0170

25

51

Sowery, Toby (R)

Honda

1m04.1363s

100.249

2.2457

0.0601

26

41

Robb, Sting Ray

Chevy

1m04.4421s

99.773

2.5515

0.3058

27

4

Simpson, Kyffin (R)

Honda

1m04.4778s

99.718

2.5872

0.0357

(R) Rookie

Lucille Dust reporting live from Toronto