BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Josef Newgarden began the day emotional and ashamed for the incidents that led to his disqualification from the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg.
He ended Friday’s IndyCar activity at Barber Motorsports Park as the fastest IndyCar driver of the session.
On Friday morning, Newgarden spoke publicly for the first time since his disqualification. Later that day, he went out and ran the fastest time in IndyCar practice with a time of 1:06.7045 around the 17-turn, 2.3-mile road course in the No. 2 Chevrolet for Team Penske.
“It’s definitely the best medicine in the world for somebody like me,” Newgarden said. “The positive thing is this car was really fast right away. This team has done a good job. I love being here with the 2 car group. I love what they do.”
The second fastest driver was Pato O’Ward at 1:06.7875 in the No. 6 Chevrolet as both drivers were the focal point of attention for one of the most impactful days in recent IndyCar Series history.
The top five included Newgarden’s speed of 124.130 mph. O’Ward followed at 123.975 mph. Team Penske’s Will Power was third in the No. 12 Verizon Chevrolet for Team Penske at 1:06.7914 (123.968 mph) as Chevrolet swept the top three positions.
Honda’s Colton Herta of Andretti Global was fourth at 1:06.8002 in the No. 26 Gainbridge Honda. Christian Lundgaard rounded out the top five at 1:06.8972 (123.772 mph) in the No. 45 Hy-Vee Honda. Romain Grosjean of Juncos Hollinger was sixth at 1:06.9639 (123.649 mph) in the No. 77 Chevrolet.
He was asked why Barber has proven to be one of his better tracks.
“I’ve got no clue,” he said. “Bit of courage maybe. I like it. I was out there today pushing it, having fun. Yeah, I mean, most of the tracks we’ve done well. I think it’s just that here for some reason it showed up more.
“I think last year, of course being on pole is pretty good. The car worked really well. There were a couple places last year we could have done very well. I think in 2022, when I joined my previous team from Dale Coyne, we had pole and P3 in Indy GP, P2 twice, never was on the podium for the last two years out of four races.
“I think the car behaves how you get there. I think I have also more experience in IndyCar that I’m able to know exactly what I want from the car. Is funny to see. We just mentioned they’re the same car, but they’re set up different team to team. How the cars behave differently is quite funny.
“Today was very competitive. Yeah, I don’t know. First time I came here; I wasn’t so fast. It’s not like it was my best track.”
Grosjean was followed by Graham Rahal’s No. 16 Honda at 1:06.9679 (123.641 mph).
“It was a good run today,” Rahal said. “Typically, fairly competitive here. But I thought it was a strong day. I feel like I left a couple tenths-of-a-second on the table, too, which is kind of disappointing. I kind of just miss-timed the tire.
“By the time I thought the tire was going to be lap two, I did a 90 percent push on lap one, went quite quick, like a low 7, like 7.1, 7.0. I thought, ‘Whoa, that’s little faster than I expected.’ I went for it on lap two. The tires were already gone for it.
“Still competitive, but I think I just missed it. Overall, it was definitely a strong day for us and the Hendrickson car.”