On a street circuit in Detroit that is unfamiliar to him, Mick Schumacher gets off to a modest start to the weekend – Josef Newgarden and Alexander Rossi are racing despite injuries
Just five days after the thrilling final lap of the Indianapolis 500, the IndyCar drivers were already back behind the wheel for the next session on Friday. The first free practice session for this year’s Detroit Grand Prix was on the schedule at the Detroit street circuit.
Mick Schumacher (Rahal-Honda) finished this first practice session of the weekend in P23 among the 25-strong field of IndyCar regulars. On the street circuit—which was still unfamiliar to him as of Friday—with its numerous bumps, Schumacher initially ranked P24 in the 40-minute session, which was open to all. He improved upon his fastest lap time up to that point (1:05.294 minutes on hard tires) during the subsequent group phase on soft tires.
As usual, Schumacher, as one of the rookies in the field, was allowed to take to the track in both 12-minute segments of the group phase (Group 1 and Group 2). Once these 24 minutes were up, the rookie at Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing (RLL) set a personal best time of 1:04.729 minutes (Result: FT1 in Detroit).
Alex Palou Sets Friday’s Fastest Time
The fastest lap of all 25 drivers on Friday, 1:02.772 minutes, was set by Alex Palou (Ganassi-Honda) during the group stage on the soft tires, the red-marked “Reds.” Second fastest was last year’s Detroit winner Kyle Kirkwood (Andretti-Honda), followed by Will Power (Andretti-Honda) in P3.
There were no incidents in the form of crashes on the first day on the treacherous street circuit. There were merely a few harmless instances of drivers braking too late into one of the emergency exits.
Among those who experienced such braking errors were the day’s fastest driver, defending champion and points leader Alex Palou, as well as the newly crowned Indy 500 winner Felix Rosenqvist (Shank-Honda; 11th) and Louis Foster (Rahal-Honda; 14th) and Sting Ray Robb (Juncos-Chevrolet; 25th).
Robb initially struggled for a long time with a faulty clutch. The defect and the necessary repairs meant that the Juncos driver from the U.S. was only able to take to the track during the final 12 minutes of the day (Group 2).
Not only Alexander Rossi, but Josef Newgarden is also racing with an injury
Alexander Rossi (Carpenter-Chevrolet), whose foot injury from Monday’s Indy 500 practice hasn’t fully healed yet, qualified in P13 on Friday in Detroit. He continues to wear the carbon splint on his right foot. But Rossi isn’t the only one racing with a minor injury.
Josef Newgarden (Penske-Chevrolet; 21st) is also racing in Detroit with a splint on his foot—in his case, his left foot. The two-time IndyCar champion needed the splint after his crash last Sunday during one of the restarts in the Indy 500.
Although Newgarden had been declared fit on Sunday at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Medical Center, he remained there until the end of the race to have his foot iced. Newgarden watched the thrilling photo finish between Felix Rosenqvist and his own Penske teammate David Malukas from the Medical Center.
At the gala dinner, which traditionally takes place in Indianapolis on Monday evening after the Indy 500, Newgarden appeared for the first time with a splint on his left foot. Just like with Alexander Rossi, however, the splint does not significantly impair his driving. Currently, both Ed Carpenter Racing and Team Penske expect the affected drivers to compete in the entire Detroit weekend.
On Saturday in Detroit, the schedule features the second free practice (FP2) in the morning and qualifying in three segments in the afternoon. Because it is a street circuit, the qualifying format adapted for this track type this season applies once again.
This means that the six-driver Q3 segment (“Fast Six”) will again be held as a single-lap time trial, with the top 6 from Q2 allowed to choose when and with which tire compound they want to drive their single Q3 lap. The fastest driver from Q2 chooses first, and the sixth-fastest driver from Q2 takes the remaining slot in the Q3 order.
