Colton Herta tops a procesional session on the streets of Toronto as all 26 out of the 27 drivers attempted to find the limits in the caverns of concrete.
Andretti appear to be the car to beat going into qualifying as a sweep of practice so far from Herta was backed up by his teammate Kyle Kirkwood who found himself in P2.
The first incident of the session saw a close call for RLL’s Pietro Fittipaldi who added his name to the list of drivers who found themselves falling victim to the turn 8 exit wall.
However, unlike the drivers who went into the wall in FP1, thanks to some nifty reactions, Fittipaldi lived to fight another day as he went nose first into the tyres, reversing out and heading back into pit lane.
The main story of the weekend so far also came as a result from the turn 8 wall, McLaren’s Alexander Rossi, fresh off the news of his departure from the team at the end of the season, committed the cardinal sin of keeping ahold of the wheel when going into the barrier, in the process breaking his thumb.
This meant McLaren found themselves short a driver, in a turn of events nobody saw coming, Theo Pourchaire who 24 hours earlier was sitting on a sofa in France was called up to make his first appearance on the streets of Toronto.
To complicate things even more, Pourchaire will be going into qualifying with no practice time, the Frenchman was not able to get out on track during FP2 as his McLaren team was busy adjusting the car.
The bumps are one of the defining characteristics of this famed street circuit, this was evidenced by the 11 car of Marcus Armstrong found himself just escaping the wall on the exit of turn seven as his car bottomed out on the harsh surface.
Rinus Veekay also found himself in trouble, the 21 car finding himself facing the wrong way in the runoff down in turn 4. Veekay was able to swiftly pirouette his machine around and continue his session as normal.
Scott Dixon was the next driver to be caught out by turn 8. The two time Toronto winner used his experience to make a swift judgement call and headed for the runoff after a lock up meant he would be unable to make the corner, not wanting to risk the same fate that has befallen so many other drivers so far this weekend.
He was not the only one to do so either, Fittipaldi only a few moments later found himself copying Dixon, the second time in the session he was caught out by turn 8. Shortly afterward, not one to miss out on the fun, Pato O’Ward did exactly the same.
The end of the session was characterised by a familiar foe around Toronto, traffic. Felix Rosenqvist found himself on the receiving end of a few incidents. Expect to see the same come qualifying.
