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David Malsher-Lopez

Indy 500: Sato puts Coyne on top on Day 1, Jimmie Johnson third

Sato ran only four laps in the morning’s two hour session, unhappy with the aero balance of his car, but come the afternoon, he shone. On his 63rd of 64 laps, the 2017 and 2020 Indy winner got a strong tow from several cars and lapped the 2.5-mile oval in 39.3118sec, an average speed of 228.939mph.

Despite his best effort receiving tow assists, he actually made up most of his speed on the opposition in the Turns, since his trap speeds were ‘only’ between 4th and 5th fastest.

His teammate, rookie David Malukas, was seventh fastest with his best lap coming in his 35th of 80 laps driving the Coyne w/ HMD machine.

This morning’s pacesetter Scott Dixon was second fastest on a very promising day for Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda, in which all five Ganassi entries finished in the top nine, with NASCAR legend but IndyCar rookie Jimmie Johnson clocking third fastest time ahead of Marcus Ericsson fourth, Alex Palou sixth and Tony Kanaan ninth.

No less encouraging was that four of the Ganassi cars lay between third and eighth on the no-tow charts.

The top two no-tow speeds came from Ed Carpenter Racing-Chevrolets of Rinus VeeKay who was fifth overall, and the team owner Ed Carpenter who was only 29th overall.

Josef Newgarden was quickest of the Team Penske-Chevrolets in eighth, while the fastest Andretti Autosport-Honda driver was the 2020 polesitter, Marco Andretti, a hair quicker than rookie teammate Devlin DeFrancesco.

P No Name FTime Diff FL Laps FSpeed Engine Team
1 51 Takuma Sato 39.3118 39.3118 63 64 228.939 Honda Dale Coyne Racing w/RWR
2 9 Scott Dixon 39.5139 0.2021 1 50 227.768 Honda Chip Ganassi Racing
3 48 Jimmie Johnson 39.5219 0.2101 77 79 227.722 Honda Chip Ganassi Racing
4 8 Marcus Ericsson 39.6311 0.3193 36 73 227.094 Honda Chip Ganassi Racing
5 21 Rinus VeeKay 39.6484 0.3366 67 76 226.995 Chevy Ed Carpenter Racing
6 10 Alex Palou 39.6523 0.3405 45 68 226.973 Honda Chip Ganassi Racing
7 18 David Malukas 39.7443 0.4325 35 80 226.448 Honda Dale Coyne Racing with HMD
8 2 Josef Newgarden 39.7583 0.4465 53 76 226.368 Chevy Team Penske
9 1 Tony Kanaan 39.7716 0.4598 40 47 226.292 Honda Chip Ganassi Racing
10 98 Marco Andretti 39.8080 0.4962 12 85 226.085 Honda Andretti Herta Autosport w/ Marco & Curb
11 29 Devlin DeFrancesco 39.8363 0.5245 60 82 225.925 Honda Andretti Steinbrenner Autosport
12 60 Simon Pagenaud 39.8411 0.5293 74 95 225.897 Honda Meyer Shank Racing
13 4 Dalton Kellett 39.8520 0.5402 73 97 225.836 Chevy AJ Foyt Enterprises
14 11 JR Hildebrand 39.8560 0.5442 60 79 225.813 Chevy AJ Foyt Enterprises
15 7 Felix Rosenqvist 39.8655 0.5537 3 77 225.759 Chevy Arrow McLaren SP
16 12 Will Power 39.9234 0.6116 36 73 225.432 Chevy Team Penske
17 15 Graham Rahal 39.9917 0.6799 62 72 225.047 Honda Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing
18 06 Helio Castroneves 40.0128 0.7010 37 98 224.928 Honda Meyer Shank Racing
19 77 Callum Ilott 40.0133 0.7015 52 56 224.925 Chevy Juncos Hollinger Racing
20 45 Jack Harvey 40.0157 0.7039 78 91 224.912 Honda Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing
21 14 Kyle Kirkwood 40.0526 0.7408 47 49 224.705 Chevy AJ Foyt Enterprises
22 3 Scott McLaughlin 40.0566 0.7448 70 83 224.682 Chevy Team Penske
23 24 Sage Karam 40.0595 0.7477 27 37 224.666 Chevy Dreyer & Reinbold
24 5 Pato O'Ward 40.0967 0.7849 19 76 224.457 Chevy Arrow McLaren SP
25 30 Christian Lundgaard 40.1232 0.8114 17 74 224.309 Honda Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing
26 26 Colton Herta 40.1259 0.8141 51 75 224.294 Honda Andretti Autosport
27 27 Alexander Rossi 40.1399 0.8281 64 71 224.216 Honda Andretti Autosport
28 20 Conor Daly 40.1520 0.8402 17 53 224.148 Chevy Ed Carpenter Racing
29 33 Ed Carpenter 40.1583 0.8465 27 58 224.113 Chevy Ed Carpenter Racing
30 6 Juan Pablo Montoya 40.1913 0.8795 11 37 223.929 Chevy Arrow McLaren SP
31 28 Romain Grosjean 40.3705 1.0587 69 83 222.935 Honda Andretti Autosport
32 25 Stefan Wilson 40.4983 1.1865 5 10 222.232 Chevy DragonSpeed/Cusick Motorsports
33 23 Santino Ferrucci 40.6529 1.3411 17 20 221.386 Chevy Dreyer & Reinbold
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