Practice 1 Highlights | 2026 INDYCAR at Long Beach

Well it's already been an incredible start to the 2026 IndyCar season and we find ourselves this week back in the LBC. Welcome to the streets of Long Beach and practice one for this round five of the 2026 NTT IndyCar Series. And what they are terming, hitherto and forevermore, to be Vibe City. And the vibes are high, the fans are out en masse. Now the spice has not changed really at all in the last ten years and for good reason. No place better than the streets of Long Beach to go hardcore racing through a downtown area. 180 miles an hour until you slam on those carbon brakes for turn one and then you wind through the narrowest section of the racetrack. I always thought the fountain was really interesting here because there's no wall to the inside, just vegetation, just landscape. You go through turn four, turn five and off camber right hander at the exit. Tricky corner and then you fire down to a pretty heavy brake zone for six. Downhill is the brake zone for six. Makes it hard to slow the thing up but you got to get a good exit as you climb back up the hill through the kink in seven and then again on the nose downhill into eight where you lead on to the back straight. Very bumpy on the brake zone into turn nine but yet again another good passing opportunity because you're getting up to 165 miles an hour. Yeah, second fastest place on the track there entering nine turn ten. Sort of a double apex situation here. A lot of fans through that section and a lot of rubber on the racetrack from the drifting that took place over the last two weeks and all the way down to 31 miles an hour. Slowest corner on the IndyCar schedule and they go back to shoreline drive and we ride on board the Estemo car with Joseph Newgarden. This cat is looking for some good fortune this weekend. Last street circuit in Arlington, not very strong for Newgarden issues during the race. A crash during practice in the defense required a chassis change. His teammate Scott McLaughlin had that huge crash at Barber at the last race. Also had to go to a chassis change. James, these guys just need a smooth Penske weekend with all three cars. Malukas has been the quiet, consistent one even though he's the new guy to the team. Yeah, he hasn't had those flash performances like we've seen out of McLaughlin and out of Newgarden, but he does have the best average finish of the three Penske drivers so far. And you said it, they've just got to have a clean easy weekend. The pace has been there at every type of racetrack so far this year. They just need to have a trouble-free run. Quite incredibly for Joseph Newgarden, it has been four long years since he's recorded a victory on a road or a street circuit. Liquid Death, the new sponsor for Mick Schumacher this weekend. Something has died to death on that car. Stuck out on track in the number 47. A man who is transitioning over to IndyCar from the World Endurance Championship and time in Formula One. Son of the seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher. Looks like problems already started here. He's rolling pretty slow through the fountain. Yeah, he's turning immediately to get out of the way. Parts of the car disappointing. I mean, every track is brand new for Mick Schumacher. Every lap is crucial. Only two practice sessions before we head into qualifying. And hopefully this is something they could just get the car back to pit lane, fire it up, and keep going. If not, it's brutal. I mean, lasting points right now. He's just looking to get every lap he can and try to settle into a groove in this rookie season. Running right now. Do you want me to turn it back on and try and come back? Negative. Negative. We don't want you to try to turn it on. Oh, boy. So they know something. That's not a great sign. That's not a great sign at all. We get eyes now on Alex Rossi. That's down in turn nine. Famously bumpy. Brake zone here. Just listen. He had a bit of rear lock. Went into front lock. Made amends for it, though. Jumped up to second quickest. 109.2. There you go. Upgrade package. Upgrade package. Upgraded livery. Liquid science on the car. Looking sharp. I look pretty sporty through turn one. You give Alexander Rossi a race car as strong as he had back in 18, 19, around a place like this. Good night. I mean, this guy destroyed the field for a couple of years at a few places like Road America, Long Beach. Have to wonder is this upgrade package is the combination of engineering settings going to give him what he needs to get it done this weekend? I'll tell you what, I mean, he's cruising a little bit now. It looks okay, but he's still working for it. He's still hustling. It's not like we sometimes see, you know, the Penske cars where it almost just looks like they're on rails. The hands are nice and quiet. He's definitely still having to hustle to get that lap time out of it. But hey, if the pace is there, I don't mind hustling. Rosenquist jumps up to second on a 108.5. Award also on a 108.5. There is Rosenquist in the middle. Oh my. A little bit lurid through the final hairpin. His car this weekend. Full arms and elbows. Sponsored by Green Day this weekend. Trey Coon, the band's drummer, will be in the fast seat in sports on Sunday. Kevin, you have news on Graham's teammate, Mick Schumacher. Yeah, we saw him coast to a stop early on, and that's the worst case scenario for someone that is learning a new track. There is the number 47 liquid death Honda back here in the Ray Hall Letterman Lanigan garage area, and it just started losing power. Then it shut off, HRC said. Don't try to restart it. So they're investigating, and it could be a myriad of things. Hopefully electronics or something minor that can be sorted very quickly, but minimum he's going to miss valuable track time trying to learn this circuit, and it still developed the car two laps in this session. Looks a lot like a bore scope going in, James, or maybe something in the injectors, perhaps. But that's a small camera. They're going in through the top into the cylinders, maybe taking a look at pistons rings. Who knows? But that's that's typically something more mechanical than electrical going on. And unfortunately for Mick Schumacher, I sincerely doubt he'll be out this session. 678 of Stingray Rob. See him getting the three for one camera angle, looking forwards, looking backwards, looking from the outside. I love this. I love getting all the different perspectives of what's happening with the 77. And unfortunately, all the perspectives are of traffic. And unfortunately for Stingray Rob, 24th and slowest of the cars out on track and to have Nolan Segal right in front of him in the McLaren, the number six machine. He's a California boy. Home race for him. You got to kind of be a little bit a little bit selfish when you're looking for track position there. So, yes, Stingray came up on him, but he wasn't about to move over because he's trying to get his clear lap, looking a little squirrely off of one there. Yeah, locked up a little bit on the brakes to at the rear axle, getting into the founder corner. See a little nine three. That's less than a second covering 18 spots. Go all the way down to 20th 19th. So roughly a second. First through 19th, you come back to a place like Long Beach where so many have experience, and it's the minutia that's going to separate the field in qualifying. I do love this view, and I also love the sound. You can really hear the IndyCar engine screaming with this onboard shot is going to come around here for the hairpin. Let's just listen to the beautiful noise. Chevy IndyCar engine doing his thing. Yeah, let's hear him all the way down the straight, slamming into the concrete on shoreline. You really appreciate the kind of brutal, raw physicality of a race engine at full song, a chassis pushing the limits on right height and a driver kind of suffering through it all. But with a big smile, you also appreciate full throttle all the way down the straight until he hits the brakes in that braking zone. Through this deceptive right hander and onto the backstretch, wickedly fast and over before you know it. Folks at home, you may think that this final part of the track, the asphalt, is much darker than at any point around the rest of the circuit, and that's because Formula Drift was here last week laying down thick black tire marks all the way through. That's about a good kind of half inch of rubber laid down through that final sector of the racetrack. It is annoying to drive over, let me tell you. Carl Kirkwood, we're riding on board with him now. 107.986 is the fastest time we've seen around the circuit today. Kirkwood holds that. He's just going faster, absolutely lighting up the track as it stands right now. Drops off a little bit through that middle part of the lap, but the opening stanza for Kirkwood was beautiful. And right now it's an Andretti Global 1-2-3. I was going to mention, guys, they were a little bit quiet in the All-Skate part of this practice session. 8th, 12th and 16th, Kirkwood, Power and Ericsson. But obviously qualifying here is super important. Only a handful of times has this race been won from beyond 5th on the grid. So about half a second for Kirkwood on the softer red compound on that first run to flying laps. His teammate here, Marcus Ericsson, sitting in second at that 108.1. Had a chance to spend some time this morning in the Acura Integra Type S with Marcus Ericsson. And one thing I noted right away, 10 tenths straight out of the pits to give us a ride around. That's exactly what Marcus Ericsson told us in the offseason he wanted to work on is, I want to be more aggressive. He was in full conversation with us when it happened. And James, he's living up to the motto there, getting it done as Power gets it done at a 107.8. Absolutely massive lap for Will Power. Fastest driver we've seen so far today through the opening and closing parts of the circuit. Absolutely brutal marker laid down for him. Wonderful run. Talk about aggressive. Power's on another push lap. And this is fascinating in terms of what we're seeing out of the soft tire. It's not just one lap they're good for. Seemingly on this second push lap, Power is finding time every single corner, every single braking zone. Power is pushing. And this is going to be a phenomenal lap. Out of turn eight there, you saw the car four-wheel drifting. Beautiful balance. What is he lowered to? A 107.6. So that's useful information, guys. Second push lap. It's still there. That's the first time I think this season that Will Power has done something where his teammates are probably going, whoa, yeah, wait a second. Give me that data. Let me see exactly what he's doing. That's a power pop that we've been expecting. And his brakes are working. Yeah. It's pretty decent still. He'll wait until things rubber up a little more. I like the fact that they're out here still running on the hard tire, getting race ready. Hauger looks aggressive. Very comfortable his first time here at Long Beach. Big slide out of turn four. Tires dropping a bit, but he's still got the softs to throw on. He'll get a chance to sample that, like you say, probably waiting for that next segment. He had me completely sold that this was going to be a McLaughlin year, and it still could be. Listen, it's still early. You can still turn things around, but man, those little mistakes can have just absolutely devastating outcomes for your confidence is a driver for the confidence of the race team and the driver. And so McLaughlin just needs to settle back in to that regular podium performance that he's demonstrated. And that what were we just saying? That was the commentators curse. I blame you. I take I take 50% of the blame for that right now. I'm glad it was a mild impact into the tires. But again, dang, guys, that's another weekend, and it's immediately what is going through his head. Boy, denied downshift on him. Didn't deny because the rear axle was locked up. Let's see if we could get it on board. We could hear that. See Tim Cendrick looking on. There's there's so much oscillation there on the brakes, so much bumps, so many bumps rather really can upset the car. And he's doing all he can to try and drift it through and avoid. It's hard to tell. Didn't sound like he was he was locking up on the rear before this denied downshift. But you rely so much on the timely downshift to slow you have as much harder hit than I first suggested there. It's a good thing he got his hands off the wheel at the last second. So, yeah, denied downshift. Basically, like you say, you're using the engine to slow you down as you downshift. That helps the engine breaking. We call it helps slow the car down. And you're absolutely on the limit on the brakes. And if you get a denied downshift, you pulled the pulled the paddle. The gear doesn't engage. You're still in that taller gear. The car's not slowing down enough. You're in a few mile an hour too quick, and that can be the result. And your whole timing expects, say, third gear. Instead, you're in fourth. The revs are low and everything feels wrong. And then it is reasonable where we sit right now is the twenty six of willpower. What's happening here? Clip that. OK, I don't lock up. OK, a little inside front. Not nearly as diabolical or terminal is what we saw from willpower at St. Pete with all the breaking issues there. He's looking good. This lap from Lucas is looking really solid. Reminds me a lot of what we saw at St. Pete. You remember when he just left a millimeter to the wall exiting in practice? Malukas really starting to push in the hands. Look so steady run down East Seaside way through the corner where his teammate found the barriers earlier Simpson. He wanted the moment about a second slower than what willpower guys get his hand off the steering wheel, the bottom to get it around. That's how tight it is. Malukas up into P4. Got tire temp now. This will be his full push lap on these reds. And here is the man who topped the all skate and he is going fast right now out there on track, fastest of all through the opening stanza of this racing circuit. Alex Pillow pushing in the Ganassi. His teammate, Kiffin Simpson, 108.6 currently sits atop the times. Just a couple of corners remain for the four-time and reigning champion. Just under three minutes of the session remaining. Where does this lap take him? And it is to the top by a considerable margin. Six and a half tenths. I love the snap of his hands to straighten the car out of the hairpin. Perfectly timed with the throttle mash. And for me, it's where the rear of the car was and how bolted down it was through that long duration Almost got in the fence. And Malukas would have been the fastest driver out there on track if he hadn't come across the car of Christian Rasmussen. Malukas improves to seventh. I feel that lap was good enough for P1. Quickest of anybody in the first and second parts of the track. And then as he got into the final few corners, found Christian Rasmussen no way through and ultimately didn't see the representative time over the line. That's a bummer. That's pretty sloppy from the 21 team in general. I mean, Christian's got mirrors, but his team's got a radio. You know that guy's on a hot lap. You're not. Yeah, that's kind of poor for him. Not necessary. This qualifying maybe, but you could have let him go. Likely he was pitting because he was on a quick one. But how close is this? Very close. And then some. All of it. And then some kind of like that Polo one. We just caught the tail end of Polo through turn. Yeah, he's an absolutely everything. Marcus Armstrong has jumped up into P2 just a tenth and a bit. That was Polo again. Really close to that wall at the exit of one. You could tell by Malukas' hand gestures, he's just probably thinking, why in the world did you have to block me on that lap? But it is just practice. Polo singing. He's pushing. He is pushing. And all three Ganassi's in the top five. Alex Polo P1, Scott Dixon P3, Kevin Simpson P5. And let's see how close he gets to the wall. Inches in it. Inches. Let's take a look at the combined times from both groups from practice run and McLaughlin. You mentioned it with Penske. Malukas didn't get a lap, but team Penske has pace. Maybe not quite as crisp as what we've seen out of Andretti. But Alex Polo, I think, has his hands full tomorrow for qualifying, James. It's not going to be straightforward, no matter which way you look at it. A lot of these drivers wouldn't have gotten the lap that they want. So still lots to figure out before we get to qualify. Two McLarens up there in the top 10 as well. Could we have a four-team fight for the pole tomorrow? It's going to be another day of practice and the thrill of qualifying as the one-lap shootout returns.