Information By: ASHLEY KELLER / CHEVROLET – LONG BEACH, CA
Will Power, driver of the No. 12 Team Penske Chevrolet, led first practice on the Streets of Long Beach, with his lap from the Group 2 setting pace overall at 1:07.3227 seconds on the 1.968-mile street course.
Team Chevy was additionally represented in the top-five of Group 2 by Team Penske teammate Josef Newgarden (third). Newgarden additionally finished third in the first 45-minute session with his fastest lap of 1.07.7858, followed by Arrow McLaren’s Nolan Siegel in fourth (1:07.8607) and Newgarden’s Team Penske teammate Scott McLaughlin in fifth (1:07.9007).
Pato O’Ward, driver of the No. 5 Arrow McLaren Chevrolet, finished fifth in Group 1, with his lap of 1:07.9477.
Saturday’s action on the Streets of Long Beach sees Team Chevy open with a second practice at 11:30 a.m. ET on FS1 followed by qualifying and the Firestone Fast Six at 2:30 p.m. ET on FS2. Additional coverage throughout the weekend can be found via INDYCAR Radio and SiriusXM Channel 218.
First Practice Top-10 Results (Combined):
- 1st Will Power (1:07.3227)
First Practice Top-10 Results (45-minute session):
- 3rd Josef Newgarden (1:07.7858)
- 4th Nolan Siegel (1:07.8607)
- 5th Scott McLaughlin (1:07:9007)
WHAT THEY’RE SAYING
Conor Daly, No. 76 Juncos Hollinger Racing Chevrolet:
“Honestly, it was just nice to be back at Long Beach. I think this is place is awesome, and the crowd today here on a Friday is like nothing I’ve seen in my life. Shoutout to the crowd for being here and supporting us. We got through a lot of changes, and definitely need a few more, but we’re learning so much as a group on the fly. I think every day is a good learning experience for us. We had some decent pace for us in our group, so we’ll see what we can do tomorrow.”
Sting Ray Robb, No. 78 Juncos Hollinger Racing Chevrolet:
“I think that we were okay on the black (primary) tires. The green (alternate) tires were shocking compared to what we had at St. Pete. I don’t know what to expect with them yet for the race but definitely have some learning to do. I think we’ll be making a lot of changes overnight. We have a lot of tools at our disposal that I we’ll get better with. I think we’ll get in the right direction, so that’s good. It’s nice to look at the groups and know that we’re okay already and still have a lot of room to go. I’m excited about tomorrow. I think we’ll roll off much better in the morning and figure out what we can do from there.”
Scott McLaughlin, No. 3 Team Penske Chevrolet:
“It was pretty good. We went early just so that we could make sure we got a decent run because we wanted to see what the tire did. Unfortunately, just caught a little bit of traffic. I felt like what I felt was good. The DEX Imaging Chevy felt good. I love this place. I love Long Beach, it just hasn’t been as kind to me in the past. We’re all good.”
Josef Newgarden, driver of the No. 2 Team Penske Chevrolet, met with members of the media after the first practice session. Transcript:
Q. Josef, going back to Thermal, obviously not the pace that all three of you guys from Team Penske wanted. Did that ring some alarm bells coming into this weekend or does it feel like back to business as usual and that was sort of an anomaly?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I think anomaly is a good way to put it. Yeah, feels like business as usual here.
THE MODERATOR: Obviously we’re joined by Josef Newgarden, sixth quick overall, third in that very first session, the 45-minute session, driver of the No. 2 Astemo Team Penske Chevrolet, finished fourth here last year. Former champion here, as well. Your thoughts on a nice start to the weekend for you.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Very good. I think our car was pretty solid rolling off just like St. Pete. Kind of speaks to our global positioning from a street course standpoint. Obviously we track this stuff. We’re trying to create good race cars across the board, which you have to have in this series. You sort of have a base position on a street course style, road course style and then ovals alike. I think our street course car has been in a really good window, felt really solid today, and happy about where we’re at and coming into the weekend. I think we can really put something good together if we stay on it.
Q. What was the differences of the feel between last year and this year with the hybrid system?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Good question. Not a lot, to be quite honest, as far as from a general standpoint. It still feels like Long Beach. I think a lot of the driving technique that you’re doing is quite similar.
You’re just adding in the hybrid utilization that we’ve kind of used for half the season last year. So you’re using it a lot. You’re regenning under braking, but this hybrid system is extremely friendly within regen, so it’s comfortable under braking. There’s nothing evil about it. It’s pretty easy to drive.
You’re just trying to make sure that you’re optimizing how much charge you’re allowed to use per lap. We have an allocated amount of energy, and you just want to optimize that for lap time and make sure that you’re using all of it.
So that’s the big difference. But as far as driving here, it feels like Long Beach of the last 10 years in a good way. Flows a lot the same that it did last year, too.
Q. With it being the 50th race here at Long Beach, how much does it mean to you to be a part of this field and just to be part of the celebration of this race?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Yeah, it’s incredible. I love being an INDYCAR driver, and one of the great things about being an INDYCAR driver is you get to race at Long Beach. It’s certainly good for our community, and I think it’s great for this community. You see great excitement when you’re here and people ask you how does this event feel different to others, and you certainly notice the energy difference at this race than you get at other places. It’s quite a joy to be a part of it.
I think the entire team has kept it alive and made it flourish for so many years, certainly with Jim and their entire group, they’ve done such a great job. Very, very proud to be a part of it as an INDYCAR driver, and hopefully we have another 50 years up the road. That would be really great.
THE MODERATOR: I thought there was a buzz today.
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: Man, we say that every year, and I think in a lot of ways the last three years they’ve just increased the capacity and size. It was no different this time around. It just felt bigger than last year. I don’t know how we can keep saying that year after year.
It looked like race day today. It was super cool. I think that’s the great thing about motorsports, though, right now. There’s an excitement. There’s a cool factor to it. If you just want to talk about trends, I think motorsports is a trend right now, especially with young people, and it’s really fun to see that. You’re just seeing this resurgence.
I’ve been talking about this in a couple different interviews. I don’t want to say it’s bizarre, but it has been unique to see over the last two years the amount of kids that I see at the racetrack that are bringing their parents. It’s not the other way around. I meet parents that are my age and they’re going, I know nothing about this, but my six-year-old loves it and loves you and loves INDYCAR. It used to be the other way around. It was, hey, whatever, I used to love INDYCAR back in the ’80s and now I’m here and I’m trying to bring my kids. But it’s the other way; the kids are bringing the parents.
It’s very, very cool to be a part of. I think we can continue that and grow it and we’re in a really good position to do it, so it’s just a fun time to be a part of motorsports.
Q. Team Penske has had a lot of success here at this track. What would you say they do differently than other teams to give you the edge?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I think it’s our execution. When you look at Team Penske, it’s really about not beating yourself in a lot of ways. This is a complex sport, and all the details matter. We always talk about details.
I describe racing in INDYCAR like solving a puzzle each weekend. The puzzle is different every track and every weekend we go to, and it’s just a matter of who figures it out first. So you’ve got to get a lot of details right to win the race and do that.
But you can also forget the simple things and you can beat yourself on race weekends, and I think at Team Penske we do try and do — we try and keep it at the forefront of our minds that we need to get the basics right. It sounds silly, but it’s like, is the car fully fueled; are our pit stops kind of just where they need to be; do we know what we’re doing strategy-wise; is everything tight.
It’s just the little things that people take for granted. I think we try and not beat ourselves, and so that execution quality is where Team Penske over the years, 50 plus years, has set themselves apart. We try and excel in other areas, too, but I think keeping the basics as a priority has served our company very well.
Q. You’ve had a couple of weeks since the Thermal Club and you weren’t able to advance out of the first round, and Team Penske struggled out there in qualifying. What has been done to prevent that from really happening again? Obviously the goal is to make it into the Fast Six, but how much has that been a motivator the last couple of weeks?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: There’s no doubt, Thermal was a disaster as far as Team Penske. We had a tough weekend. The good thing is we’re just getting going, though. A lot of people have been asking about how is the year, and we’re two races in. We had an excellent St. Pete. Our cars were in a good window. Team did a great job.
Then Thermal was the complete opposite. We were just sort of nowhere.
I think we sort of found our way towards the end, back half of the way. We diverged between the race cars and I think we found a direction. So that would be the answer to — going back in the future, I think we have a direction to come back with. So yeah, we can’t erase what happened. We can’t go back. It was a tough weekend. Just did not go very well. But I don’t think it’s an indicator of the rest of the year in a lot of ways.
Q. Can you tell us a little bit about what you learned this session with your beautiful primary tires and your alternates?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: It may be a four-stop race. Marcus was answering the question, I’m like, three-stop? Three-stop would be good, if you could do it. Yeah, we’re going to see. I think in a lot of ways the complexion will be similar to St. Pete, and the consensus coming out of St. Pete I think will carry over to here and you’ll see the same sort of commitment or execution at this race.
The primary tire is very robust and certainly feels like a really solid tire. I was super happy with the car right out of the box and very comfortable and pretty easygoing across multiple stints and then I think the alternate has some good speed that you can extract but it’s got a very tight window and doesn’t have a lot of durability.
So I think anyone that can figure out how to add durability to that is going to be doing something magical. I don’t know that anyone is going to find a combination that makes it work necessarily, but that’s what adds the excitement. You’re going to pick and choose now, and you’re going to see what people do in the race.
It’s early in the weekend. If the track just continues to grip up, which is historical Long Beach, every single session this place just gets faster. It’s just a little easier on the tires. It’s hard for me to predict the future today. Maybe we get to the race and someone can make the alternate work and run a strategy where you run the alternate late in the race. I don’t think that’s going to be preferred at this moment, but you just never know.
Q. Are you liking how much of a factor that race strategy, specifically tire strategy, has been playing this season? Would you rather it just be left up to the animals on track to go maximum attack the whole time?
JOSEF NEWGARDEN: I like the variedness. We kind of get that in a lot of different ways in INDYCAR. The tires is just another component of that. It goes up and down. Sometimes we have a very consistent tire. Sometimes we have an alternate like we have this weekend where they’re quite fast for a lap but they degrade heavily. It never bugs me. It comes back to my analogy that racing in INDYCAR is like solving a puzzle, and that puzzle is never the same. Year over year even, same track, the puzzle changes.
I don’t mind it. I think there’s certainly a uniqueness to this current puzzle with the tires, and it’s added some excitement. Certainly when you look at Thermal, there was a lot of ways you could approach it. You’re learning on the fly.
At Thermal we kind of went into Saturday feeling one way about the tires and then even Sunday morning we felt the same way about them as we did Saturday, and then we got out of the warmup in Thermal and we thought, oh, no, we might have just made a mistake just from what we learned with the tires and then we put ourselves in a bad position going into the race.
It just keeps you on your toes. I think it’s certainly exciting for us. It makes us do our jobs really well, and I think it can add excitement to the track, so I love it.