Barber IndyCar: Sato takes pole, leads RLLR 1-2

Sato started the Firestone Fast Six shootout on primary-compound tires, but switched to the alternate compound for a single flying lap. His 68.593sec was enough to edge teammate Rahal by 0.1037sec and clock a 120.711mph lap of the 2.3-mile course.

Scott Dixon manhandled his Chip Ganass Racing-Honda to third, little more than two-tenths off Sato and only 0.0395sec ahead of James Hinchcliffe in the Arrow Schmidt Peterson Motorsports-Honda.

Sebastien Bourdais’ Dale Coyne Racing with Vasser-Sullivan-Honda will start fifth, alongside the fastest Chevrolet runner, Spencer Pigot of Ed Carpenter Racing-Chevrolet.

That selection of runners means that for the first time since Long Beach five years ago, no Team Penske-Chevrolets made the Firestone Fast Six.

Will Power, who started the first two races of the year from pole position, will start seventh, after making a small mistake on his first flyer and aborting the lap – a decision he came to regret, having taken the edge off the red alternate tires so his second lap was not quite enough to transfer. He will be joined on the fourth row by Alexander Rossi, fastest of the Andretti Autosport-Hondas.

Colton Herta, rookie winner of the last round at Circuit of The Americas, will start ninth in the Harding Steinbrenner Racing-Honda alongside fellow rookie Santino Ferrucci in the second Dale Coyne Racing-Honda and ahead of Ryan Hunter-Reay (Andretti) and Jack Harvey (Meyer Shank Racing SPM-Honda).

Surprise exclusions in Q1 included the other two Penske-Chevrolets of Simon Pagenaud and championship leader Josef Newgarden, which will roll off 14^th and 16^th tomorrow, and Felix Rosenqvist in the second Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda.

Patricio O’Ward will start 18^th, ahead of Carlin-Chevrolet teammate Max Chilton, while Ed Jones was disappointingly off Ed Carpenter Racing-Chevy teammate Spencer Pigot in Q1.

Arrow Schmidt Peterson Motorsports-Honda’s Marcus Ericsson will start only 20^th, but did well to recover from his morning shunt to lap less than 0.15sec slower than teammate Hinchcliffe in Q1 Group 2.

The AJ Foyt Racing-Chevrolets of Tony Kanaan and Matheus Leist went straight out on the alternate compound tires in Q1 Group 1, and immediately turned impressive times, but all that served to do was flag up that Firestone’s fresher set of reds – as opposed to yesterday’s ‘old’ batch – would produce the better times. That brought all their rivals – bar Rossi – into the pits to switch from primaries to alternate compound rubber, and bumped the Foyt cars out of a transfer spot.

Firestone Fast Six

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Laps	Time	Gap	Interval	Mph
1	30	Takuma Sato	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	4	1'08.5934			120.711
2	15	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	3	1'08.6971	0.1037	0.1037	120.529
3	9	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	4	1'08.8081	0.2147	0.1110	120.335
4	5	James Hinchcliffe	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	3	1'08.8476	0.2542	0.0395	120.266
5	18	Sébastien Bourdais	Dale Coyne Racing	2	1'09.0189	0.4255	0.1713	119.967
6	21	Spencer Pigot	Ed Carpenter Racing	4	1'09.6074	1.0140	0.5885	118.953

Q2

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Laps	Time	Gap	Interval	Mph
1	5	James Hinchcliffe	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	5	1'08.4074			121.040
2	21	Spencer Pigot	Ed Carpenter Racing	5	1'08.5951	0.1877	0.1877	120.708
3	9	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	5	1'08.6123	0.2049	0.0172	120.678
4	30	Takuma Sato	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	5	1'08.6234	0.2160	0.0111	120.659
5	15	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	6	1'08.6996	0.2922	0.0762	120.525
6	18	Sébastien Bourdais	Dale Coyne Racing	6	1'08.7860	0.3786	0.0864	120.373
7	12	Will Power	Team Penske	5	1'08.8248	0.4174	0.0388	120.305
8	27	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	5	1'08.8866	0.4792	0.0618	120.198
9	88	Colton Herta	Harding Racing	5	1'08.9130	0.5056	0.0264	120.151
10	19	Santino Ferrucci	Dale Coyne Racing	6	1'09.0213	0.6139	0.1083	119.963
11	28	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	5	1'09.0764	0.6690	0.0551	119.867
12	60	Jack Harvey	Meyer Shank Racing	4	1'09.2967	0.8893	0.2203	119.486

Q1 Group 2

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Laps	Time	Gap	Interval	Mph
1	9	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	5	1'08.4996			120.877
2	15	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	6	1'08.5104	0.0108	0.0108	120.858
3	12	Will Power	Team Penske	6	1'08.5397	0.0401	0.0293	120.806
4	28	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	6	1'08.6872	0.1876	0.1475	120.546
5	30	Takuma Sato	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	5	1'08.7171	0.2175	0.0299	120.494
6	5	James Hinchcliffe	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	6	1'08.7545	0.2549	0.0374	120.428
7	22	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske	6	1'08.7943	0.2947	0.0398	120.359
8	2	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske	6	1'08.8700	0.3704	0.0757	120.227
9	31	Patricio O'Ward	Carlin	7	1'08.9011	0.4015	0.0311	120.172
10	7	Marcus Ericsson	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	6	1'08.9226	0.4230	0.0215	120.135
11	59	Max Chilton	Carlin	6	1'09.0566	0.5570	0.1340	119.902
12	81	Ben Hanley	DragonSpeed	6	1'10.4165	1.9169	1.3599	117.586

Q1 Group 1

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Laps	Time	Gap	Interval	Mph
1	21	Spencer Pigot	Ed Carpenter Racing	6	1'08.3548			121.133
2	88	Colton Herta	Harding Racing	6	1'08.3762	0.0214	0.0214	121.095
3	19	Santino Ferrucci	Dale Coyne Racing	7	1'08.5672	0.2124	0.1910	120.757
4	18	Sébastien Bourdais	Dale Coyne Racing	7	1'08.5930	0.2382	0.0258	120.712
5	27	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	6	1'08.8013	0.4465	0.2083	120.347
6	60	Jack Harvey	Meyer Shank Racing	6	1'08.8605	0.5057	0.0592	120.243
7	98	Marco Andretti	Andretti Autosport	4	1'08.8950	0.5402	0.0345	120.183
8	4	Matheus Leist	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	6	1'08.9477	0.5929	0.0527	120.091
9	10	Felix Rosenqvist	Chip Ganassi Racing	6	1'08.9630	0.6082	0.0153	120.064
10	14	Tony Kanaan	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	5	1'09.0327	0.6779	0.0697	119.943
11	20	Ed Jones	Ed Carpenter Racing	6	1'09.0441	0.6893	0.0114	119.923
12	26	Zach Veach	Andretti Autosport	6	1'09.4478	1.0930	0.4037	119.226