Helio Castroneves, who has earned the Verizon P1 Award the past two Verizon IndyCar Series races, recorded the quickest lap time in the 45-minute practice session preceding the three rounds of knockout qualifications for the Angie’s List Grand Prix of Indianapolis.
Castroneves, driving the No. 3 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, slipped to the top of the time chart on his final lap of the session at 1 minute, 10.3756 seconds on the 2.439-mile, 14-turn Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course.
The May 9 race (3:30 p.m. ET on ABC) will mark Castroneves’ 300th Indy car start.
Sebastien Bourdais, driving the No. 11 Team Mistic E-Cigs – KVSH Racing Chevrolet, was second quick (1:10.4013). He was quickest in the May 7 morning practice at 1:10.9378 and bettered it in the afternoon session (1:10.8839) for fourth quick overall.
Simon Pagenaud was third (1:10.4777) in the No. 22 DeVilbiss Team Penske Chevrolet and teammate Will Power was fourth (1:10.5038) in the No. 1 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet. The top 15 cars were separated by less than a second.
Pagenaud set the track record of 1:09.6716 last May in the first segment of knockout qualifications and went on to win the inaugural Verizon IndyCar Series race on the road course. Sebastian Saavedra earned the Verizon P1 Award in the Firestone Fast Six last May with a lap of 1:23.8822 in wet/drying track conditions.
The first of three segments of knockout qualifications is at 3 p.m. (ET). All the sessions are streamed live on RaceControl.indycar.com, supplemented by live Timing & Scoring and the Advance Auto Parts INDYCAR Radio Network broadcast.
