Dixon heads shortened opening practice

Scott Dixon has ended Thursday practice from the Texas Motor Speedway on top of the timesheets, as the opening session of the weekend concluded early.

A yellow was brought out early on in the event for a light sprinkle of rain, which didn't take long to pass, allowing the track to go green and the cars to get back out on track.

However, before the hour mark, a sudden downpour hit the circuit, making driving conditions impossible and forcing race control to cancel the session early, while teams scrambled to cover the cars and equipment.

Dixon's average lap speed was a 219.308 mph, which was just marginally faster than Takuma Sato, who ended up in second place. 

Sato's teammate Graham Rahal was third making it three Honda-powered cars in the top three, while the fourth and fifth positions saw Charlie Kimball and Will Power - two Chevrolet cars.

The only other Chevrolet to reach the top ten was Ed Carpenter, who finished the shortened practice session in tenth. 

Three Andretti's ended the day inside the top ten with Alexander Rossi, Zach Veach and Ryan Hunter-Reay in sixth, eighth and ninth respectively. Their semi-teammate Colton Herta was seventh.

Despite the shortened session, drivers managed to clock in a considerable number of laps, as Power proving to be the busiest driver with 48 laps to his name.

Kimball, who was one position ahead of Power on the final timesheet, clocked 19 laps - the fewest of the 22 drivers who took part in the session.

Conor Daly makes his return following his adventure at the Indianapolis 500 with Andretti Autosport, but was last in the session. However, the American will have another session on Friday before qualifying gets underway.