P1racenews AI automatic summary:
William Byron led Saturday’s extended NASCAR Cup Series practice session at Circuit of The Americas at 94.703mph (129.626s). Byron jumped to the top of the leaderboard as the session drew to a clos…
William Byron led Saturday’s extended NASCAR Cup Series practice session at Circuit of The Americas at 94.703mph (129.626s) by jumping to the top of the leaderboard as the session drew to a close. The teams were given a total of 40 minutes on track split into two 20-minute sessions since COTA is the first road course race of the season with the new rules package that debuted at Phoenix Raceway. In practice, Ty Gibbs was second fastest at 94.681mph, followed by Alex Bowman in third (94.416mph), Bubba Wallace fourth (94.260mph), and Christopher Bell fifth (94.226mph). Kyle Busch (94.132mph) was sixth fastest, Ross Chastain seventh (94.129mph), and Kamui Kobayashi eighth (94.021mph) in a third car for 23XI Racing. Kyle Larson (93.980mph) and Shane van Gisbergen (93.947mph) completed the top 10. Some notable drivers further down the speed chart were Ryan Preece (22nd), Noah Gragson (23rd), Michael McDowell (26th), and Brad Keselowski (30th). Among them, Denny Hamlin was 33rd, Josh Berry 36th, and Erik Jones 37th. Tyler Reddick, defending race winner, was 12th fastest in practice with AJ Allmendinger 17th, and Chase Elliott 20th. In total, there are 39 drivers entered in the EchoPark Automotive Grand Prix, with no driver running 10 consecutive laps in practice.
