INDIANAPOLIS — The Honda’s worked during Indianapolis 500 practice this week on qualifying sims. The Chevy’s didn’t really do that. The speed charts were reflective of that. The bowties were found towards the bottom of the daily speed charts this week while Honda’s were found up top. But, we didn’t see that as a reason for concern because the Penske foursome and the three Ed Carpenter Racing cars looked the best in traffic.

Penske and ECR have been the have combined to win five of the last eight Indy 500 poles and have just been so dominant in qualifying here.

When the boost gets turned up on Fast Friday and their setups get more geared for qualifying, they’d certainly rise right?

On Friday, they didn’t.

Now, they look like they’re fighting for spots 10th on back. I wouldn’t be shocked if the Honda’s not only swept the front row, but they could sweep the Fast Nine at that too.

Will Power put it bluntly on Friday saying that they just aren’t fast and that they simple can’t compete with the Honda drivers for this year’s pole.

“I don’t think we have that ultimate speed of some of the Honda cars,” said Power. “We have a consistent car. Yeah, it wasn’t massive changes, nothing that would change the speed of the car. If anything we did things that would slow it down as far as adding some more downforce.

“It’s just going to be real interesting tomorrow when everyone is in the same condition with no cars on track, no tow, to see where we truly do stack up. My feeling is that we’ll be lucky to get in the top nine. That’s how I feel. I think there’s just a lot of fast cars out there right now.

“I think the only thing on our side is maybe we can hold a lap time longer. That’s the saving grace.”

Power, has won 58 career Indy Car poles, most among all active drivers and trails Mario Andretti by nine for most ever. For him to say that, well that holds a lot of merit in my brain.

He’s made the Fast Nine every year here since 2009 too.

His teammate and defending series champion Josef Newgarden agreed.

“We got to be realistic in looking at our speeds from a no-tow, pure lap pace,” Newgarden said “I think a top 10 is going to be a fight, but we’re going to fight with the Shell car.”

The reason that they have been struggling is, Honda’s are faster on the straightaways. For Chevy to match them, they have to trim out further. The problem is, the further they trim, the worse they get in the corners which is forcing a ton of understeer and them having to get out of the throttle.

They worked on it all day and finally found a bit of speed in happy hour, but with qualifying tomorrow ending before the time the speeds went up on Friday, wouldn’t that favor the Honda’s still?

Chevrolet has won all but one Indy pole since they’ve returned to the series in 2012. That is in jeopardy now this weekend.