St. Petersburg : Practice 1
source:
irl.racing-live.com
After a years worth of preparation, the IndyCar
Series has finally run their first official practice session on the 14 turn,
1.8mile mile street circuit in St. Petersburg, Florida. When the two hour
session was completed, four cars had suffered various incidents, while Helio
Castroneves navigated the slippery track in 1:03.8308seconds (101.518 miles per
hour).
Under beautiful clear blue skies, Castroneves raced along the Tampa Bay in front
of multi-million dollar yachts and curious race fans, as his previously left
turn only Toyota powered Dallara appeared well- suited for the bumps and right
turns of the St. Petersburg race course.
Saving their faster slick tires for later in the session when conditions could
be exploited by the higher grip tires, most teams elected to spend the first
twenty minutes of the session running with their rain tires mounted in spite of
a totally dry race track.
The session was green for just a few minutes before AJ Foyt, IV shoved the nose
of the famous number 14 into the turn ten tire barrier. Running a Panoz chassis
for the first time, Foyt's car suffered very limited damage in the incident and
he would quickly return to the track. Tomas Scheckter would also nose into a
tire barrier, though he suffered his incident in turn four.
Patrick Carpentier would bring out a yellow midway through the session when
his engine appeared to fail going down the front straightaway and he had to be
towed to the pit area. Sam Hornish, Jr., also had to get a tow after he spun in
turn one.