Herta rocketed to the top of the leaderboard with a 1m01.572s lap around the tight and twisty 1.645-mile, nine-turn temporary street circuit based in the heart of Motor City.
“Thankfully, I got one and it ended up being perfect and the tires were in the right temperature window,” said Herta, who nailed his quick lap after 22 minutes to set the best mark of the session.
“I mean, you have to take the practice results with a grain of salt because there are guys that are really fast that just get screwed and don't get laps. But luckily we were one of the lucky ones that got a lap.
“Hopefully, we can carry that over to qualifying.”
Kirkwood ended up 0.165s behind to claim second, but after the session he and Ferrucci had an exchange on pit lane, with the AJ Foyt Racing driver claiming Kirkwood turned into him following an on-track altercation.
Ferrucci was seen shoving Kirkwood, with the Peacock audio picking up Ferrucci saying, “You f****** piece of s***, you turned into me!”
Kirkwood stopped attempting to talk to Ferrucci, walking off and smiling back to his timing stand.
Chip Ganassi Racing’s Alex Palou was third, after setting the pace in opening practice on Friday, while Arrow McLaren’s rookie Theo Pourchaire impressed to go fourth before he crashed hard late on.
Santino Ferrucci, A.J. Foyt Enterprises Chevrolet
Photo by: Josh Tons / Motorsport Images
Agustin Canapino (Juncos Hollinger Racing) was fifth, with Team Penske’s Scott McLaughlin in sixth ahead of Christian Lundgaard (Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing), Penske’s Will Power and Chip Ganassi Racing’s Scott Dixon.
Josef Newgarden, the recently crowned two-time Indianapolis 500 winner, completed the top 10 in the third Penske entry.
The 45-minute session started off sour for Andretti Global’s Marcus Ericsson, who was sidelined for the initial 15 minutes with an electrical issue. He ended up 13th by the end.
Kirkwood flexed the early pace by going top of the timesheets with a 1m02.916s flying lap before being bumped by Canapino just over 12 minutes into the morning’s practice with a lap of 1m02.772s.
Lundgaard also rotated to first temporarily before Palou replaced him with a quick lap of 1m02.284s, and then went even faster with a 1m02.011s run the following lap after 20 minutes.
Several drivers were found getting caught in various runoff areas, including two-time and reigning IndyCar Series champion Palou. Dixon was among them, ending up stalled in Turn 1 in the opening seven minutes. Helio Castroneves, who is replacing rookie Tom Blomqvist for this weekend (and next), also had an off in Turn 8 while avoiding Canapino.
Foyt's Sting Ray Robb also ended up stranded in Turn 3, along with Ed Carpenter Racing’s Rinus VeeKay in Turn 8, which also caught out the likes of Pourchaire, among others.
Ferrucci and Herta had a close moment in the last 12 minutes. Herta approached Ferrucci in the Turns 6-7 complex and lightly touched wheels before the former was able to pull off an inside pass in Turn 8 as Ferrucci dove to pit lane.
Herta improved his time in the final six minutes, hitting a 1m01572s flying lap, with Kirkwood also improving with a run at 1m01.738s to go second.
Pourchaire’s ability to test the limits showed signs of paying off after going fourth in the last handful of minutes with a 1m01.942s lap. But the Frenchman also pushed too hard and brought out the session’s only red flag with just over a minute left to go, hitting the Turn 9 barrier.
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Source: Autosport