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| Will Power opens Belle Isle weekend on top |
Will Power topped the one and only practice session ahead of the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix doubleheader on Friday. Power ran a lap at 77.2768 seconds and finds himself as the favorite for pole position ahead of Saturday's race one. He has not won a pole position in the first six races of 2021. It is his longest drought without a pole position since he went ten races between pole positions from Austin to Mid-Ohio in 2019. He has never started on pole position for the seventh race of a season. Power only has one pole position at Belle Isle and that was for the first race in 2015.
Sébastien Bourdais ended up second practice, 0.1523 seconds behind Power. Bourdais has two victories at Belle Isle, but those are his only top five finishes at the track. He has only two other top ten finishes at the track, including a ninth in the most recent race. He has never started better than sixth at Belle Isle. Bourdais' last pole position was at Phoenix in 2018 and he has not won a pole position for a street course since the first Toronto race in 2014.
Patricio O'Ward made it a top three sweep for Chevrolet, 0.2375 seconds off Power. O'Ward ran at Belle Isle in 2019 and he finished 14th and 11th in those two races. O'Ward's only top ten finish in five street course starts was second at St. Petersburg last year. The Mexican is one of four drivers to win a pole position this season, as he took the top spot at the Barber season opener.
IndyCar's most recent pole-sitter Scott Dixon was the top Honda, 0.3410 seconds off the top. Dixon had a 15-race top ten streak snapped after he finished 17th in the Indianapolis. In 2019, Dixon followed up 17th at Indianapolis with a 22nd at Belle Isle when he brushed the inside the barrier in turn six and ended up in the tires on the outside of the corner. Dixon has not started consecutive races on pole position since 2008 when he won pole position at Kansas and the Indianapolis 500.
Alexander Rossi rounded out the top five, just under four-tenths back. Rossi has not started better than tenth since he started second for the season opener at Barber. He has started on the front row in three consecutive Belle Isle races and he has started in the top four in five of the last six Belle Isle races. Rossi's most recent pole position was for the first Belle Isle race in 2019.
Colton Herta was just over a half-second behind Power in sixth. Herta was 12th in both Belle Isle races in 2019, and it was the first of three consecutive doubleheader weekends Herta finished in the same position in both races. He was fifth in both Road America races and 19th in both Iowa races last year. In the three doubleheader weekends since, he had at least one top five finish each weekend.
Marcus Ericsson ended up in seventh. Ericsson has never started in the top ten on a street course. His best starting position was 12th in the second Belle Isle race in 2019. Ericsson went on to finish second in that race and he led his first two laps of his IndyCar career.
Josef Newgarden ran a 68.0329-second lap, and he was the closest Team Penske car to Power. Newgarden has finished in the top ten of the seventh race of the season every year he has driven for Team Penske. Three of those are top five finishes, including his Belle Isle victory in 2019.
Rinus VeeKay is one of seven drivers in the field making their Belle Isle debut and he topped the Detroit debutants in ninth. VeeKay completed a session-high 32 laps. He has three consecutive top ten finishes, tied for the longest streak of his IndyCar career. He was sixth, fourth and eighth between the Gateway doubleheader and the first Mid-Ohio race last year.
Ryan Hunter-Reay rounded out the top ten in practice, and Hunter-Reay was the final car within a second of Power's time. Hunter-Reay has four consecutive top five finishes at Belle Isle, but he has started in the top five for only one of those, the first race in 2018. In 17 Belle Isle starts, Hunter-Reay's average starting position is 9.7.
James Hinchcliffe had a good practice in 11th. Hinchcliffe has started in the top ten in six consecutive Belle Isle starts and in ten of his last 11 appearances. He has finished outside the top ten in his last nine starts, the longest drought of his IndyCar career. His previous longest drought was five races, from Mid-Ohio to Sonoma to close out the 2018 season.
Takuma Sato ended up in 12th in practice. Two years ago, Sato picked up his fifth podium finish on a street course when he was third in the first Belle Isle race. The only other street course where Sato has multiple podium finishes is São Paulo, where he was third in 2012 and second in 2013.
Romain Grosjean returns fresh off his runner-up finish in the Grand Prix of Indianapolis, and he was 13th in practice, 1.3084 seconds behind Power. Grosjean was 13th at St. Petersburg last month after starting 18th. The last driver to follow up a runner-up finish with a first career victory was Robert Doornbos at Mont-Tremblant in 2007.
Felix Rosenqvist wound up 14th in practice. Rosenqvist has not had a top ten finish in his last eight starts. He has not started in the top ten in his last seven starts. He had started in the top five of five races prior to this slump.
Championship leader Álex Palou was 15th in practice, 1.5228 seconds off Power. Palou has led a lap in each of the first six races this season. He is one of three drivers with at least 100 laps led. Palou sits on 103 laps led. Palou could become the first driver to open a season with seven consecutive races led since Hélio Castroneves did it in 2006. Palou will have to serve a six-spot grid penalty for making an unapproved engine changes between Carb Day and the Indianapolis 500.
Graham Rahal was 16th. Rahal had his streak of three consecutive top five finishes snapped with his accident in the Indianapolis 500. It was the first time Rahal has had three consecutive top five finishes since he swept the Belle Isle doubleheader in 2017 and followed it with a fourth at Texas.
Conor Daly enters Belle Isle with 40 laps led this season, but if he wants to add to that total, Daly will have to improve from his practice result of 17th. The most laps he has led in a season is 56 in 2016. He has led 16 laps at Belle Isle. He has only led more laps at Indianapolis, Mid-Ohio and Iowa. This is Daly's second-best track in terms of average finish among tracks with at least three starts at 11.2. Only Gateway is better at 7.3.
Max Chilton slid into 18th. Chilton has finished 24th in his last two starts. It is the first time he has finished outside the top twenty in consecutive races since he was 21st at Austin and 22nd at Barber in 2019. He has one top ten finish on a street course in his IndyCar career, a seventh at Toronto in 2017. Chilton has finished 11th twice at Belle Isle.
Simon Pagenaud's Belle Isle troubles continue. Pagenaud was 19th in practice, and he has started outside the top ten in four of the last five Belle Isle races. The Frenchman has five consecutive top ten finishes, his longest streak since he had 11 consecutive top ten finishes across the 2019 and 2020 seasons. He ended 2019 with nine consecutive and had two more to start 2020. He has not finished in the top five of the first Belle Isle race since he was third in the rain-shortened race in 2015.
Ed Jones rounded out the top twenty, 1.8041 seconds back. Jones has finished on the lead lap of every odd-numbered race this season, but he has finished off the lead lap in every even-numbered race this season. He has only finished on the lead lap in 27 of 53 career starts.
Jack Harvey was 2.0365 seconds behind Power's time. Harvey has started outside the top ten in only three of his last 14 road/street course starts. He has finished outside the top ten in his last three starts, however, the Indianapolis 500 was the first time he finished better than his starting position this season. He started 20th and finished 18th.
Santino Ferrucci ended up 21st in practice. Ferrucci's average starting position at Belle Isle is 17.5 with his best starting position being 13th. This is his second IndyCar weekend this season. He led 20 laps in the second Belle Isle race in 2019 as he went off strategy, but he had to make a pit stop under caution and was shuffled back, ultimately finishing tenth.
Dalton Kellett will be making his Belle Isle debut and he trailed Power by 3.5303 seconds. Kellett made his first IndyCar street course start at St. Petersburg in April where he started 24th and finished 23rd. He lost an engine after 67 laps in that race.
Scott McLaughlin completed only five laps in practice before he got into the tire barrier on the exit of turn five and he finished up 24th. Among the drivers to have started every race this season, Scott McLaughlin has the seventh best average finish at 10.5. He is one of three drivers to have completed every lap this season. McLaughlin, Scott Dixon and Simon Pagenaud have completed all 935 laps.
Jimmie Johnson has yet to finish last this season, but he was at the bottom of practice, 5.4585 seconds off over and 1.6099 seconds off McLaughlin's top time. Johnson was only one lap down at the Grand Prix of Indianapolis, the first time he did not finish multiple laps down this season. It was also the first time he did not cause a caution in a race.
Qualifying will take place at 11:00 a.m. ET.
Group one will feature Power, O'Ward, Rossi, Ericsson, VeeKay, Hinchcliffe, Grosjean, Palou, Daly, Pagenaud, Harvey, Kellett and Johnson.
In group two, Bourdais leads Dixon, Herta, Newgarden, Hunter-Reay, Sato, Rosenqvist, Rahal, Chilton, Jones, Ferrucci and McLaughlin.
The top six drivers from each group will advance into round two, where the top driver will earn pole position.
NBC's coverage of the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix Race One begins at 2:00 p.m. ET with green flag scheduled for 2:05 p.m. ET. The race is scheduled for 70 laps.
