Rain was the big winner Friday at Indianapolis. Credit: Autostock

Rain cancels Friday practices at Brickyard

Cup cars will practice Saturday morning and qualify in the afternoon

SPEEDWAY, Ind. -- A day-long steady rain at Indianapolis Motor Speedway wiped out both of Friday's Nextel Cup practice sessions, forcing NASCAR officials to reschedule a pair of Saturday morning practices in order to give the 53 cars and teams time on the historic 2.5-mile oval before Bud Pole Qualifying at 4:10 p.m. ET.

ALLSTATE 400 •   Qualifying Order

The revamped Allstate 400 at the Brickyard schedule now includes two one-hour practice sessions, starting at 9 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. ET. The cars will then be impounded after qualifying.

The weather for the rest of the weekend appears to be much better. Saturday's forecast is for partly sunny and 85 degrees, while Sunday is expected to be mostly sunny and 88, with a 20 percent of rain on either day.

Rain might be the only thing that can slow down Ryan Newman, who really wanted to see what his No. 12 Dodge could do Friday.

"It is what it is," Newman said. "If it rains, then we don't practice.

"From our standpoint, we tested before everybody else and the track was a little bit different. These other guys tested later. We'll just have to see if we can play catch up if we don't get to practice."

Newman said a strong qualifying run not only provides good track position at the start, but it allows a team to choose a more favorable pit position, especially at Indianapolis.

"We'd definitely like a shot in qualifying here," Newman said. "We think we can qualify well, and that's important as far as pit selection. It's relatively difficult here because of a tight pit lane."

The pit lane isn't the only thing difficult to navigate. With 60-foot wide straights and 90-foot corners, it's not easy to pass, even with a new track surface since last year's race.

"There's always going to be one fast groove," Newman said. "You have to have a guy that's misbalanced pretty bad to be able to work around him or underneath him.

"The way the cars are with the aerodynamics and stuff, they're more sensitive than they've ever been. It's definitely going to be a sticky situation, but you can make an effort to pass people. Whether we can pull it off or not, we'll have to wait and see."