IndyCar finally was able to complete its first practice session of the weekend, and Team Penske looked strong right out of the gate.
There were numerous small rain showers that moved through the St. Louis area in the morning, which delayed the start of track action by two and a half hours.
Even during the 60-minute session, there were a couple small stoppages in order to inspect the track that was barely dry enough to host racing speeds.
From the start, Josef Newgarden was the fastest driver around the 1.25-mile oval.
Newgarden completed a lap in 25.2465 seconds and averaging 178.243 MPH. He only completed 14 laps during the entire session, such was his confidence in the starting package.
Second on the timesheets was Scott McLaughlin, with last year’s pole sitter getting off to a strong start as well.
David Malukas was third quickest, putting in a lap just under the 145 MPH barrier and showing that he still enjoys this track.
Championship leader Alex Palou was fourth fastest, followed by Pato O’Ward in fifth in his Arrow McLaren Chevy.
For the most part, there were no issues on track and no stoppages outside of the couple short track inspections.
Santino Ferrucci reported a large discrepancy with his AJ Foyt Racing team-mate who was third quickest, and will hope the team can track down the problem before qualifying.
Nolan Siegel turned the most laps overall, completing 51 laps and setting the 16th best time of the afternoon.
The next session is qualifying, which gets underway in just over two hours at 4:30 PM central time.
