{"id":36085,"date":"2025-07-19T17:17:36","date_gmt":"2025-07-19T21:17:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/?p=36085"},"modified":"2025-07-19T17:17:36","modified_gmt":"2025-07-19T21:17:36","slug":"four-takeaways-from-the-honda-indy-toronto-practices","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2025\/07\/19\/four-takeaways-from-the-honda-indy-toronto-practices\/","title":{"rendered":"Four Takeaways From The Honda Indy Toronto Practices"},"content":{"rendered":"

The drivers hit the track in Toronto, Friday afternoon and Saturday, for practice 1 and 2. It gives drivers a chance to figure out the setup, decide which tires work best, and overall see how the track feels ahead of the all-important qualifying and the race<\/span><\/p>\n

Takeaways From Honda Indy Toronto’s Practice Sessions<\/h2>\n

Andretti Global driver Kyle Kirkwood, who has seen success on this season’s street courses, was atop the speed chart in Friday\u2019s opening practice with a lap of 1 minute, 1.2054 seconds in the No. 27.\u00a0 While Andretti teammate and last year\u2019s winner Colton went fastest in session two with a lap time of 1 minute, 0.0578 seconds.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
Colton Herta during the Honda Indy Toronto weekend, July 19, 2025. Photo by Chris Owens, Penske Entertainment.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A few things have stood out in these sessions that could make things a little bit more complicated. Here are three takeaways from the two practice sessions.<\/span><\/p>\n

Very Low Grip<\/h3>\n

Kyle Kirkwood said it’s \u2018probably the lowest amount of grip I’ve driven in INDYCAR in a very long time\u2019 and that was evident all throughout the first session.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Christian Lundgaard started it off with a moment with the wall on the exit of turn 11. Championship leader Alex Palou also had a couple of brushes against the wall.<\/span><\/p>\n

Turn 8 also proved tricky. In one instance, the cars of Scott McLaughlin, Pato O\u2019Ward, and Santino Ferrucci ended up there at the same time; luckily, there was no contact.<\/span><\/p>\n

The lack of grip could be attributed to the snowy winter weather and the fact that there aren’t many support series here, so when the drivers hit the track, they’re running over the dust.<\/span><\/p>\n

The New Bump:<\/h3>\n

Any street track is bumpy, but a new bump has appeared in the streets of Toronto that could cause a problem for drivers.<\/p>\n

Team Penske\u2019s Will Power, who had the fifth-quickest lap overall, highlighted the bump<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a massive new bump at the end of the straight into (Turn) 3,\u201d he said. \u201cIt actually hurts (and it\u2019s) right in the braking zone\u201d<\/p>\n

Turn 3 is usually one of the more easier overtaking spots in Toronto, but with the new heading into 3, drivers will begin to feel apprehensive up the inside during the race.<\/p>\n

The bump was created after a bit of repaving due to the removal of a bridge. Will Power even suggested grinding the sport ahead of Sunday’s race, which was Friday night<\/p>\n

Green Tires Are Too Soft:<\/h3>\n

After the first practice session, the Firestone Firehawk alternate green race tires that are provided for all temporary street course races seemed to be too soft around the streets of Toronto.<\/p>\n

Power said it feels like it will for sure be a three-stop race. With all these questions about how the tires will perform, more questions arise as to what tires to use in quali and the race. Do they maximize track position in qualifying and use multiple green or do they save those tires for the race?<\/p>\n

Andretti Looks Fast Again:<\/h3>\n

Last year in Toronto, Andretti finished 1-2 with Herta and Kirkwood, and from the first two practice sessions, they look to be fast again<\/p>\n

Today, Kirkwood followed his impressive practice 1 time with the second-fastest time in practice two. He finished behind his teammate Herta. The two drivers are about a half-second faster than the next-best driver.<\/p>\n

“These Andretti guys are freaking fast,” Arrow McLaren’s Pato O’Ward said after the session.<\/p>\n

Next on the schedule is NTT P1 Award qualifying at 2:30 p.m. ET (FS1, FOX Sports app, INDYCAR Radio Network). The 90-lap race will be at noon ET (FOX, FOX Sports app, INDYCAR Radio Network).<\/p>\n

Main Photo:\u00a0<\/strong>Joe Skibinski, Penske Entertainment<\/p>\n

Recording Date: 7\/19\/2025<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The drivers hit the track in Toronto, Friday afternoon and Saturday, for practice 1 and 2. It gives drivers a chance to figure out the setup, decide which tires work best, and overall see how the track feels ahead of the all-important qualifying and the race Takeaways From Honda Indy Toronto’s Practice Sessions Andretti Global […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5307,"featured_media":36102,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6,1663],"tags":[1600,2108,1154,2164,1657],"class_list":["post-36085","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-indycar","category-ntt-indycar-series","tag-alex-palou","tag-andretti-global","tag-colton-herta","tag-honda-indy-toronto","tag-kyle-kirkwood"],"modified_by":"Hayden Murdock","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36085","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5307"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36085"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36085\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36103,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36085\/revisions\/36103"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}