By alley - May 16, 2017, 11:05 AM ET

Rookies halfway to ROP completion

Ed Jones romped through Rookie Orientation with ease, Fernando Alonso finished his three phases during the May 3 private test at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and the other two rookies...they'll try again today.

Jones and Alonso continued to look like old pros as they worked the 2.5-mile oval with ease on Monday, and of the four rookies, the reigning Indy Lights winner nearly logged more miles than the other three combined.

"It was a good day," said the Briton, who turned 94 laps to the 110 produced by Alonso, Jack Harvey and Zach Veach. "We completed the rookie orientation in the morning and that went very well, and then we started progressing after that. We started gaining experience on the track with the car, working on getting close to the other cars and getting comfortable. I'm looking forward to progressing throughout the week."

The Spaniard was busy during the two-hour session dedicated to rookies but lost most of the four-hour afternoon session with rear suspension problems.

"The last half an hour maybe we had some issues with the rear suspension, and we could not complete the program that we had planned to run a little bit in traffic at the end of the day, so we missed that part, but overall it was an amazing day," he said.

Veach (pictured, Michael Levitt/LAT photo) missed all but the waning moments of the two-hour ROP session and made sporadic outings later in the day. He'll hit the track with the second and third ROP phases to complete.

"Overall, even though we only got a few laps of running, we're really happy with today," the Ohio product said. "We're still just getting last bits of body fit done on the car and getting us prepared for the rest of the week and qualifying of course."

Harvey's day began with a car that refused to leave the pit box without stalling and ended with the ignominious distinction of

becoming the first driver to crash during practice

for the 101st Indy 500. Like Veach, he only got through the first ROP phase on Monday.

"It's been a pretty challenging day for what was meant to be an easy process," the Briton said of the fuel pressure (morning) and steering malfunction (afternoon) that blighted his Indy debut. "We had some issues this morning, but we had managed to work through them. To have that happen, and I don't know what did happen apart from I went to turn in and it went straight.

"I was coming out of the pits. I wasn't even going fast. I was probably not even going 100 mph. So bizarre. We had just done a long run and had pitted because there was a yellow flag and then had that happened. It was so random. Hopefully it's the last time we come to the medical center."

Veach and Harvey will have plenty of time on Tuesday – six hours from 12-6 p.m. ET – to graduate from ROP and get down to business preparing for the May 28 race.