Nashville IndyCar: McLaughlin beats Grosjean to pole
Scott McLaughlin delivered his second career pole with top qualifying time for the Big Machine Music City GP, beating a resurgent Romain Grosjean, after lightning during a rainstorm caused a 90-minute delay.
Firestone Fast Six
Five of six drivers emerged from the pits on alternate tires, with only Josef Newgarden coming out on primaries and with enough fuel to last him throughout the session.
Christian Lundgaard had a long lock-up on his alternate tires braking into Turn 4, allowing Scott McLaughlin to take top spot with a 1min15.2275sec. Lundgaard on fresh alternates then delivered a 1min14.7149sec, but he was beaten by 0.0174sec by Andretti Autosport-Honda’s Romain Grosjean.
However, McLaughlin saved his best ’til last to land a 1min14.5555, 0.142sec faster than Grosjean.
Palou was 0.35sec shy but marginally ahead of O’Ward, while Newgarden’s tire tactic didn’t work, almost 0.6sec from pole.
P |
Name |
FTime |
Diff |
FL |
Laps |
FSpeed |
Engine |
Tire |
Team |
1 |
Scott McLaughlin |
1:14.5555 |
- |
3 |
3 |
101.401 |
Chevy |
A |
|
2 |
Romain Grosjean |
1:14.6975 |
0.1420 |
3 |
3 |
101.208 |
Honda |
A |
|
3 |
Christian Lundgaard |
1:14.7149 |
0.1594 |
3 |
3 |
101.185 |
Honda |
A |
|
4 |
1:14.9087 |
0.3532 |
4 |
4 |
100.923 |
Honda |
A |
||
5 |
1:14.9261 |
0.3706 |
3 |
3 |
100.899 |
Chevy |
A |
||
6 |
Josef Newgarden |
1:15.1461 |
0.5906 |
4 |
4 |
100.604 |
Chevy |
P |
Team Penske |
Q2
Palou went straight out on alternates and soon emerged on top with a 1min15.4413, although Scott McLaughlin beat him by two tenths on primaries. The next driver to hit the top was Christian Lundgaard, despite serving a drive-through penalty for impeding another driver, and on his second lap on the alternates he delivered a 1min14.8086 to shade Josef Newgarden and Will Power, before Scott McLaughlin hit the top spot with a 14.6788sec.
Then Palou moved to the top by 0.0351sec while Romain Grosjean and Christian Lundgaard got through ahead of Newgarden. Will Power should have been through, but he slid into the Turn 9 run-off, and that caused a local yellow flag that briefly impeded Pato O’Ward. That meant Power had his best lap deleted, dropping him to eighth, and appropriately allowed O’Ward into the Firestone Fast Six.
P |
Name |
FTime |
Diff |
FL |
Laps |
FSpeed |
Engine |
Tire |
Team |
1 |
Alex Palou |
1:14.6437 |
- |
6 |
7 |
101.281 |
Honda |
A |
Chip Ganassi Racing |
2 |
Scott McLaughlin |
1:14.6788 |
0.0351 |
5 |
6 |
101.234 |
Chevy |
A |
Team Penske |
3 |
Romain Grosjean |
1:14.7679 |
0.1242 |
6 |
6 |
101.113 |
Honda |
A |
Andretti Autosport |
4 |
Christian Lundgaard |
1:14.8086 |
0.1649 |
5 |
5 |
101.058 |
Honda |
A |
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
5 |
Josef Newgarden |
1:14.8284 |
0.1847 |
5 |
7 |
101.031 |
Chevy |
A |
Team Penske |
6 |
Pato O'Ward |
1:14.9373 |
0.2936 |
5 |
7 |
100.884 |
Chevy |
A |
Arrow McLaren SP |
7 |
1:14.9616 |
0.3179 |
5 |
6 |
100.852 |
Honda |
A |
Dale Coyne Racing with HMD |
|
8 |
Will Power |
1:14.9818 |
0.3381 |
7 |
7 |
100.824 |
Chevy |
A |
Team Penske |
9 |
1:15.3112 |
0.6675 |
5 |
6 |
100.383 |
Honda |
A |
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
|
10 |
1:15.3897 |
0.7460 |
7 |
7 |
100.279 |
Chevy |
A |
Ed Carpenter Racing |
|
11 |
1:15.9758 |
1.3321 |
6 |
6 |
99.505 |
Honda |
A |
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
|
12 |
1:16.5600 |
1.9163 |
5 |
6 |
98.746 |
Chevy |
A |
AJ Foyt Enterprises |
Q1 Group 2
On primaries, Penske’s Will Power went fastest, clocking a 1min15.5796sec lap, ahead of Arrow McLaren SP-Chevy, Pato O’Ward, Scott McLaughlin, Christian Lundgaard before everyone pitted for alternates. Power then lowered his time by half a second, but that wasn’t enough to prevent McLaughlin shading him by 0.037sec, before Power set a 1min14.7460 and pitted. McLaughlin also ducked into the 14.7s, and pitted, while Lundgaard and Graham Rahal ensured all three Rahal Letterman Lanigan cars advanced to Q2, looking at least as strong as they did in Toronto.
Romain Grosjean became the only Andretti Autosport-Honda to graduate, while Pato O’Ward’s Arrow McLaren SP-Chevy got through. Those who didn’t included Ganassi’s title contenders Scott Dixon and Marcus Ericsson, the pair split by Kyle Kirkwood who was disappointed not to pull through having been fifth quickest in second practice.
P |
Name |
FTime |
Diff |
FL |
Laps |
FSpeed |
Engine |
Tire |
Team |
1 |
Will Power |
1:14.7460 |
- |
6 |
6 |
101.143 |
Chevy |
A |
Team Penske |
2 |
Scott McLaughlin |
1:14.7742 |
0.0282 |
6 |
6 |
101.104 |
Chevy |
A |
Team Penske |
3 |
Christian Lundgaard |
1:14.8331 |
0.0871 |
6 |
6 |
101.025 |
Honda |
A |
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
4 |
Romain Grosjean |
1:15.1382 |
0.3922 |
6 |
6 |
100.615 |
Honda |
A |
Andretti Autosport |
5 |
Pato O'Ward |
1:15.1494 |
0.4034 |
6 |
7 |
100.600 |
Chevy |
A |
Arrow McLaren SP |
6 |
Graham Rahal |
1:15.2383 |
0.4923 |
5 |
6 |
100.481 |
Honda |
A |
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
7 |
Scott Dixon |
1:15.3179 |
0.5719 |
6 |
6 |
100.375 |
Honda |
A |
Chip Ganassi Racing |
8 |
Kyle Kirkwood |
1:15.4382 |
0.6922 |
6 |
6 |
100.214 |
Chevy |
A |
AJ Foyt Enterprises |
9 |
Marcus Ericsson |
1:15.4501 |
0.7041 |
6 |
6 |
100.199 |
Honda |
A |
Chip Ganassi Racing |
10 |
1:15.5935 |
0.8475 |
5 |
6 |
100.009 |
Honda |
A |
Dale Coyne Racing w/RWR |
|
11 |
1:16.3955 |
1.6495 |
6 |
7 |
98.959 |
Chevy |
A |
Ed Carpenter Racing |
|
12 |
1:16.5898 |
1.8438 |
6 |
6 |
98.708 |
Honda |
A |
||
13 |
1:17.5888 |
2.8428 |
6 |
6 |
97.437 |
Honda |
P |
Chip Ganassi Racing |
Q1 Group 1
With six minutes remaining Devlin DeFrancesco’s car came to a halt at Turn 4, causing a red flag and thus eliminated himself from qualifying. This came before anyone had set a meaningful lap on primaries, prompting everyone to then emerge from the pits on the alternate tires – green sidewalled for this event to signify the fact that Firestone has constructed the sidewalls from guayule, a sustainable plant.
With a minute remaining, the battle for top spot appeared to be between Josef Newgarden, Alex Palou and Colton Herta, but then last year’s polesitter Herta locked up going into Turn 4 and slid into the tire wall. His car stalled, and that brought out the red flag once more. That ended the session, leaving two potential Firestone Fast Six contenders – teammate Alexander Rossi and Felix Rosenqvist – unable to graduate having not set a representative time.
Those who did get through to Q2 were Alex Palou (Ganassi-Honda), Jack Harvey (Rahal Letterman Lanigan-Honda), David Malukas (Dale Coyne Racing with HMD-Honda), Josef Newgarden (Penske-Chevrolet), Rinus VeeKay (Ed Carpenter Racing-Chevrolet) and – for the first time ever – Dalton Kellett of AJ Foyt Racing-Chevrolet.
P |
Name |
FTime |
Diff |
FL |
Laps |
FSpeed |
Engine |
Tire |
Team |
1 |
Alex Palou |
1:15.9983 |
- |
4 |
5 |
99.476 |
Honda |
A |
Chip Ganassi Racing |
2 |
Jack Harvey |
1:16.6324 |
0.6341 |
4 |
4 |
98.653 |
Honda |
A |
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing |
3 |
David Malukas |
1:16.6882 |
0.6899 |
4 |
5 |
98.581 |
Honda |
A |
Dale Coyne Racing with HMD |
4 |
Josef Newgarden |
1:16.7541 |
0.7558 |
4 |
5 |
98.496 |
Chevy |
A |
Team Penske |
5 |
Rinus VeeKay |
1:17.7101 |
1.7118 |
4 |
5 |
97.285 |
Chevy |
A |
Ed Carpenter Racing |
6 |
Dalton Kellett |
1:17.7521 |
1.7538 |
3 |
4 |
97.232 |
Chevy |
A |
AJ Foyt Enterprises |
7 |
1:19.4039 |
3.4056 |
3 |
4 |
95.209 |
Honda |
A |
Meyer Shank Racing |
|
8 |
Felix Rosenqvist |
1:21.1784 |
5.1801 |
1 |
5 |
93.128 |
Chevy |
A |
Arrow McLaren SP |
9 |
Alexander Rossi |
1:21.4579 |
5.4596 |
4 |
5 |
92.809 |
Honda |
A |
Andretti Autosport |
10 |
1:57.6982 |
41.6999 |
3 |
4 |
64.232 |
Chevy |
A |
Juncos Hollinger Racing |
|
11 |
Colton Herta |
3:26.3303 |
130.3320 |
4 |
4 |
36.640 |
Honda |
A |
Andretti Autosport w/Curb-Agajanian |
12 |
Devlin DeFrancesco |
No Time |
--- |
-- |
1 |
--- |
Honda |
A |
Andretti Steinbrenner Autosport |
13 |
1:30.3065 |
14.3082 |
1 |
1 |
83.715 |
Chevy |
P |
Paretta Autosport |
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