Difficult Indy return for Alonso at open test

Fernando Alonso’s experienced a difficult return to Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Wednesday as wet weather and an electrical issue on his car limited his test running ahead of next month’s Indianapolis 500.

Two years on from his debut at the race, two-time Formula 1 world champion Alonso will return to the Indy 500 in May knowing victory would see him become only the second driver in history to complete the ‘triple crown of motorsport’.

After completing a private test at Texas Motor Speedway at the beginning of the month with McLaren, Alonso took part in the first collective IndyCar oval test of the year at Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Wednesday in the build-up to next month’s race.

However, the Spaniard had a more difficult day than anticipated. Wet weather led to lengthy red flag periods through the day, while an electrical issue on the McLaren-entered Dallara-Chevrolet car meant he could only complete 29 laps in total.

Alonso finished as the slowest driver in the rookie orientation/refresher session with a best lap speed of 218.690 mph.

“Unfortunately, the weather was not stable enough to follow the times that we had in terms of practice,” Alonso said.

“At the end, it was not enough laps and not enough time on the car to get the proper feeling.

“It was frustrating for everyone, I guess. We lost a little bit of time at the beginning. This was more or less expected because it was a brand new chassis, a brand new car.

“We expect to run slowly, step by step, short runs at the beginning.”

While the setbacks prevented Alonso from completing the Refresher Session, leaving him with some boxes still to tick at the official start of practice for the Indy 500 next month, he was nevertheless happy to be back on-track at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

“It's good to be back, to feel again the magic of the place,” Alonso said.

“The facilities when you come in the morning, you see the size of everything again, doing the medical checks in the morning, preparing for the running in the afternoon. It felt good.”

In the separate veteran test session, Takuma Sato set the fastest lap for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, recording an average speed of 226.993 mph to finish ahead of Ed Carpenter and Spencer Pigot.