Maybe they oughta re-name the joint Power Motorsports Park.
Will Power followed up his Monday pace-setting with the fastest time both on Tuesday and of the week for the Verizon IndyCar Series’ two-day test at Barber Motorsports Park. His best lap in the No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet on Tuesday was 1:07.0608, set on his 41st of 62 laps.
Power, now in five years with Team Penske at Barber, has this record: the 2010 and 2011 poles, the 2011 and 2012 race wins, and a sweep of both preseason test sessions in 2013 and 2014 at the 2.38-mile road course in Birmingham, Ala.
Unlike on Monday though, Power had competition from other teams in the top three. Justin Wilson, who’s gotten in a substantial amount of seat time this winter, took his No. 19 Dale Coyne Racing Honda up to second at 1:07.0646, a mere 0.0038 of a second off the pace.
With defending series champion Scott Dixon also within a tenth, at 1:07.0791 in the No. 9 Target Chip Ganassi Racing Chevrolet, the top of the field was tightly bunched.
In truth, the whole field was. Barely more than 1.3 seconds covered Power up front to former teammate Oriol Servia, now with Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, 22nd and last at 1:08.3943.
Takuma Sato again impressed in fourth for A.J. Foyt Racing, with Ryan Briscoe fifth in the NTT Data Chip Ganassi Racing entry.
Bryan Herta Autosport’s Jack Hawksworth was best of the three rookies in 12th, three tenths clear of Carlos Munoz (Andretti Autosport) in 16th and six tenths up on Mikhail Aleshin (Schmidt Peterson Motorsports) in 20th. Considering Hawksworth was a late add to the No. 98 Honda, getting within six tenths of Power was a rather good day’s work.
INDYCAR OPEN TEST – TUESDAY TIMES