Simon Pagenaud quickest, Will Power crashes in opening St. Petersburg practice

Simon Pagenaud led the way for Penske in the opening practice session of the 2016 IndyCar season at St. Petersburg on Friday morning as teammate Will Power crashed out.

Pagenaud rose to the top of the timesheets with 10 minutes remaining in the session to take P1 for Penske with a best lap of 1:01.7246, finishing 0.06 seconds clear of Jack Hawksworth at the chequered flag.

Most of the drivers opted to stay in the pits to begin with to allow the track to rubber in, but Hawksworth opted to get in some early laps in his A. J. Foyt Enterprises car, topping the timesheets ahead of Helio Castroneves and teammate Takuma Sato before the stoppage.

The session was red flagged with 30 minutes remaining when two-time St. Petersburg winner Will Power slammed into the wall at the exit of Turn 9, causing severe damage to his Penske car.

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Power confirmed that the crash was not the result of an issue on the car, telling IndyCar Radio: "I was adjusting the brake bias and the wheel just ripped out of my hand at the corner."

Once the clean-up had been completed, just 15 minutes remained in the session, resulting in a mad dash out of the pit lane as the drivers looked to turn in some more laps before the end of FP1.

Pagenaud managed to depose Hawksworth from top spot with 10 minutes remaining, with his lap being enough to hold on to P1 until the end of the session. Castroneves and Sato remained third and fourth respectively following their early laps.

Ryan Hunter-Reay finished fifth for Andretti Autosport ahead of 2015 champion Scott Dixon and his Chip Ganassi Racing teammate Tony Kanaan. Juan Pablo Montoya ended up eighth, while Charlie Kimball and Carlos Munoz rounded out the top 10.

The 2016 rookies opted to focus on lap count instead of pushing for the quickest time, with Max Chilton racking up 34 laps in his Ganassi at the bottom of the classification. Alexander Rossi ended as the top rookie in 18th ahead of Spencer Pigot and Conor Daly, while Mikhail Aleshin ended his first session since returning to IndyCar full-time in 21st place.