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Fernando Alonso fourth quickest in Thursday practice for the Indy 500

Britain's Jay Howard led the way at the Brickyard; Alonso posts his fastest lap of the week

Fernando Alonso finished Thursday practice for the Indianapolis 500 fourth quickest, as Britain's Jay Howard led the way at the Brickyard.

Alonso replicated his performance of the previous day as he continues to build towards qualifying ahead of a bid for stage two of motorsport's triple crown, having already won the Monaco GP and eyeing a future drive at the Le Mans 24 Hours.

The Spaniard's best lap saw him post an average lap speed of 225.619 mph, as he completed the 2.5 mile oval in 39.8902 seconds. The lap was by far Alonso's fastest of the week and over a second better than he had achieved in windy conditions on Wednesday.

"We tested a couple of different trims and different setup options," Alonso said.

"The car felt quite OK from the very beginning of the morning, but then I think we did improve it during the day, so I'm quite happy.

"We worked still a lot on the race situation, keeping other guys out there and running in traffic. I think we found a good balance for traffic. I think tomorrow we will concentrate a little bit more alone on qualifying, but the priority is the race."

With the aid of his Andretti Autosport team-mates, Alonso was able to gain further experience of running in traffic during the final 'happy hour' of the day's five-hour session, which most teams used to work on race rather than qualifying setups.

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Like Alonso, Howard is making his 2017 debut at the Indy 500, having last driven an IndyCar in 2011. The Briton clocked an average lap speed of 226.744 mph to set the pace for Schmidt Peterson Motorsports.

"Just got back in the groove of things," Howard said. "Kind of like riding a bike, you know, you don't forget. This place just as magical as it was last time I was here."

Image: Britain's Jay Howard set the pace on Thursday

Alonso's Andretti team-mates Ryan Hunter-Reay and Marco Andretti were second and third quickest as Honda-powered cars dominated.

Underlying the pace of the Andretti cars, Takuma Sato was the fastest driver without the benefit of an aerodynamic tow clocking on the non-tow timesheet with a 224.734 mph

Josef Newgarden was the best placed of the Chevrolet runners, but his day was brought to an early end after heavy contact with the wall.

As for the other British drivers, Max Chilton was 21st (223.783 mph), Pippa Mann 25th (223.048 mph) and Jack Harvey 29th (223.048 mph).

Friday is known as "Fast Friday" at the Indy 500 as the teams are allowed to turn the horsepower up further for the final practice session ahead of qualifying.

Indy 500 Thursday Practice Top 20 Time Sheet

Driver Team Speed (mph) Time (secs)
Jay Howard Schmidt Peterson Motorsports 226.744 39.6924
Ryan Hunter-Reay Andretti Autosport 225.826 39.8537
Marco Andretti Andretti Autosport 225.709 39.8743
Fernando Alonso McLaren Honda Andretti 225.619 39.8902
Josef Newgarden Team Penske 225.455 39.9193
Sage Karam Dreyer & Reinbold Racing 225.185 39.9671
Charlie Kimball Chip Ganassi Racing 225.141 39.9750
Oriol Servia Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing 224.837 40.0290
Takumo Sato Andretti Autosport 224.771 40.0408
Sebastian Bourdais Dale Coyne Racing 224.725 40.0490
Mikhail Aleshin Schmidt Peterson Motorsports 224.611 40.0693
Will Power Team Penske 224.563 40.0779
Alexander Rossi Andretti Herta Autosport 224.503 40.0885
Juan Pablo Montoya Team Penske 224.471 40.0942
Helio Castroneves Team Penske 224.407 40.1057
Scott Dixon Chip Ganassi Racing 224.388 40.1091
Graham Rahal Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing 224.351 40.1157
Ed Jones Dale Coyne Racing 224.331 40.1193
Carlos Munoz A. J. Foyt Enterprises 224.291 40.1264
Ed Carpenter Ed Carpenter Racing 224.051 40.1695

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