Kirkwood fires off fast in Friday practice at Mid-Ohio

Kyle Kirkwood headed the 27-deep field on Friday at the Honda Indy 200 at Mid-Ohio as his Andretti Global team opened the event with exceptional pace shown across all three of its cars.

Kirkwood generated a lap of 1m05.827s in the No. 27 Honda to comfortably lead Arrow McLaren’s Pato O’Ward in the No. 5 Chevy (1m06.016s), Chip Ganassi Racing’s Alex Palou in the No. 10 Honda (1m06.040s), Team Penske’s Josef Newgarden in the No. 2 Chevy (1m06.179s), and Andretti’s Marcus Ericsson in the No. 28 Honda (1m06.232s) in the top five.

Ganassi’s Kyffin Simpson was impressive in sixth with the No. 8 Honda (1m06.285s) and Andretti’s Colton Herta, who went off track twice and crashed once, was seventh in the No. 26 Honda (1m06.315s).

“We were really fast right now, so as long as we continue that, we'll be in a really good spot,” said Kirkwood, who’s chasing Palou for the championship. “We've come here this year with maybe a different philosophy than what we had [last] year, and it seems to be working out. Marcus is really quick here. We'll reconvene after this session, but [his car] is looking pretty good.”

Friday’s Fourth of July running kicked off at 4:35 p.m. ET as high humidity and peak heat for the day of 87F made for a toasty celebration of independence and open-wheel racing. After eight minutes of running, five cars had done at least one lap when the caution flew for Jacob Abel who spun and stalled exiting Turn 1.

With 14 minutes gone, Newgarden set the first representative lap to lead the field with a 1m08.078s. Kirkwood topped it the next lap with a 1m07.700s tour. Seventeen minutes in, Christian Lundgaard reset the standard with a 1m07.027s and Newgarden pitted after recording a 1m07.168s to go P2.

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The red flag was needed in Turn 9 after 20 minutes when he flew off the road and into the barriers with the back of his car. The damage, while repairable, was too much to continue in the session. Before the red, O’Ward moved to P2 with a 1m07.117 and Ericsson climbed to P3 with a 1m07.164s lap.

Herta shot off of Turn 1 after 25 minutes and went for a wild ride but was able to drive away. O’Ward lost the rear of his car leaving Turn 11 and sat in the grass before pulling back onto the track with five minutes to go in the full-field session.

Ericsson took P1 at 1m06.834s and was followed in P2 by Louis Foster at 1m06.936s and then Will Power claimed the top spot with two minutes left with a 1m06.822s lap.

It was another off for Herta that brought out the second red of the session after backing into the Turn 6 wall. The all-cars session expired under the red, which left a top five of Power, Ericsson, Foster, Lundgaard, and Simpson.

Nearing the halfway point of the 13-minute split session, Kirkwood was P1 with a 1m05.827s lap ahead of O’Ward at 1m06.106s. Ericsson was P3 at 1m06.232s.

With three minutes left, Palou improved to P3 with a 1m06.041s lap ahead of Ericsson and Marcus Armstrong went to P5 with a 1m06.425s run.

The session ended with Kirkwood, O’Ward, Palou, Ericsson and Armstrong as the top five.

Five minutes into the last split session, a red flag was required to tend to Felix Rosenqvist’s car, which slowed on approach to Turn 4 with a voltage issue reported involving the hybrid unit.

Returning to green, Herta was fastest at 1m06.315s and Newgarden took P1 with two minutes left at 1m06.179s. Graham Rahal was P3 at 1m06.338s. Lundgaard was P4 at 1m06.376s and Simpson was on the way to closing the top five with a lap of 1m06.393s but leapt to P2 on the final lap with a 1m06.285s.

UP NEXT: Practice two, Saturday at 10:35 a.m. ET.

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