Alex Tagliani was the fastest in Friday practice with a time of 1:18.2096. The Hondas of Scott Dixon and Josef Newgarden were second and third with the Chevrolets of Will Power and Ryan Hunter-Reay rounding out the top five.
Mike Conway was sixth in his first race weekend at Dale Coyne Racing. James Jakes was seventh ahead of Helio Castroneves, Simon Pagenaud and Takuma Sato.
Six red flags slowed Friday practice at Belle Isle. Almost immediately a red flag came out for Josef Newgarden stopping on track. Ryan Briscoe brought out the second red for a spin. The third red was thrown when ducks were walking on the race course. Scott Dixon made it four when he stalled and James Hinchcliffe was the reason for the fifth red flag when the Canadian got into the tires at turn one. With a little more than fifteen minutes remaining, James Jakes stalled on track bringing out the sixth red flag.
Due to the red flags there was a limited amount of time during practice and one second only covered the top eleven times. Justin Wilson was eleventh, ahead of the Andretti Autosport teammates EJ Viso and points leader Marco Andretti. Chevrolets took positions fourteenth through seventeenth with Sebastián Saavedra, James Hinchcliffe, Simona de Silvestro and AJ Allmendinger.
Graham Rahal was eighteenth ahead of former Newman-Haas teammate Sébastien Bourdais, who will be making his 100th start in American open-wheel racing at Belle Isle. Ryan Briscoe was twentieth in his first session with Panther Racing. Charlie Kimball was twenty-first ahead of Indianapolis 500 winner Tony Kanaan. Rookie Tristan Vautier was twenty-third, Ed Carpenter was twenty-fourth with Dario Franchitti being the slowest on the timesheet. Franchitti brushed the wall just prior to the red flag brought out by his teammate Dixon.
Firestone Fast Six qualifying for race one will be at 3:00 p.m. ET.
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