DETROIT, Mich — For the second straight race, Alex Palou will start on the pole in an NTT INDYCAR SERIES race. Palou went 1:01.8592-seconds in the third and final round in his No. 10 Dallara-Honda on Saturday afternoon to score the pole on the streets of Detroit for Sunday’s Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix (3 p.m. ET, NBC, INDYCAR Radio Network).
“Yeah, that was a good lap,” boasted Palou. “We had a lot of speed since practice one. The track evolved a lot, but it seemed like our car kept on evolving, even during qualifying. I just had lots of confidence to go out there.
MORE: 5 things I’m watching for Sunday’s Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix
“I thought it was going to be a bit tighter in Fast Six. So, yeah, pretty happy that we were able to get that first pole position on a street course.”
Two weeks ago, he set the fastest pole speed ever in Indianapolis 500 history at 234 mph. That’s two poles in two races after having one in his previous 49.
“I don’t know, honestly,” Palou said on why the influx of poles now. “We’ve always been really close. We had a lot of Fast Six appearances, but we were not able to get the most of it from the used alternate tires. At IMS we had to do that.
“Here it seemed like we did a step. But, yeah, IMS road course, for example, we lacked again. We lost pole position there. We started third.
“I think we’ve always been there, just not fast enough on Fast Six. This was the first time we were able to get all of it.”
Among his three career poles, they’ve come on a natural road course (Portland), a street course (Detroit) and an oval (Indianapolis).
At this point, Palou has a ton of momentum leading into Sunday’s race now. In going back to last season, he has a top eight finish in each of the last seven races including two wins and a top five finish in six of them.
“It feels amazing,” Palou said of this momentum.” You need to try to ride the wave while you have it. Yeah, happy that we have a wave and that we can ride it because we know the season is really long, you have some races that don’t go that well. We need to try to make the most of it, try and win tomorrow if we have the chance because I know we will have the car to do so.
“So, yeah, we’ll give our best.”
Scott McLaughlin (1:02.1592-seconds) rolls off alongside in his No. 3 Dallara-Chevrolet. The Team Penske driver has his sixth front row qualifying effort. In his previous five, he’s finished 1st (St. Pete), 2nd (Texas), 1st (Mid-Ohio), 2nd (Nashville), 1st (Portland).
“Yeah, yeah. Full credit, Alex, that was a bad-ass lap, man. Good job on the older tires there,” said McLaughlin.
“Pretty happy with P2. I’ve had a pretty average month of May in my standards. Nice to bounce back here in Detroit. New track. Rebound with a P2 to start tomorrow.”
Palou hopes that the start of Sunday’s race is different than the one he watched from the INDY NXT on Saturday for which the pole sitter was punted in the braking zone. He is hopeful McLaughlin doesn’t push too hard going into the single groove first corner.
“Yeah, I think it’s going to be hopefully smooth and calm. But it’s also a long straight, so they’re going to get a big tow from me,” said the pole sitter.
“I don’t know. He’s going to go aggressive, and he should. I don’t expect him or anybody to go slow on the first lap. Hopefully we can try and keep the first position, then try and be up front.
“We know we have a lot of speed. If we have clean air, we’ll be able to have a good race.”
McLaughlin though admitted that he is hopeful that it’s on the calmer side for he and those around him.
“Yeah, you don’t know. It is what it is. Same for everyone,” he says. “Hopefully just everyone, cool heads prevail, but you just never know.
“Yeah, we’ll go in with the same aggression, see how we come out. It’s not the track I’m worried about, it’s just the outside. Everyone on the outside line, it’s going to be interesting.
“We’ll be all right. With the track, there’s been a lot of noise I’ve seen in Twitter, from other drivers and stuff. At the end of the day this is a new track, new complex. I think what everyone has done to get this going, like the vibe is awesome. Belle Isle was getting old. We had to do it.
“Yeah, first-year problems. It’s always going to happen. It’s just going to get better from here. The racetrack for the drivers is a blast. We don’t even know how it races yet. Everyone is making conclusions already. They probably just need to relax and wait for tomorrow. I just had to get that in. Sorry.”
Romain Grosjean (1:02.28960-seconds) and Scott Dixon (1:02.4272-seconds) will share Row 2 while the top 2 in last Sunday’s Indy 500, Josef Newgarden (1:02.5223-seconds) and Marcus Ericsson (1:02.6184-seconds) each share Row 3.
Big Teams Get It Right
Team Penske and Chip Ganassi Racing have won each of the last 10 NTT INDYCAR Series championships. They enter Sunday’s race on the heels of a 1-2 finish in last week’s Indy 500. They’ve also won 5 of the 6 races this year and 39 of the 52 (75%) of the races with the Aeroscreen.
For Sunday’s race in Detroit, they have 6 of the top 7 starters including a sweep of the front row.
Is this their race to lose?
Penske Passes McLaren On Pace
On Friday, McLaren ended the day ahead of the Penske’s. On Saturday, all three Penske’s are now ahead of the McLaren’s.
Pato O’Ward and Felix Rosenqvist each made the second round, but will only start ninth (Rosenqvist) and 10th (O’Ward) respectively.
For O’Ward, this is his worst starting spot of the season. He had qualified third, fifth, sixth, third, fifth and fifth respectively prior. In fact, this is his worst qualifying effort since Toronto last season (15th). He had 13 straight starts in the top 4 rows.
Alexander Rossi didn’t advance out of the first round and starts 13th. That’s all three coming from spots 9-13th. 5 of his 7 starts this season have been 10th-13th now.
By comparison, two Penske drivers ended up in the Fast Six while the other, Will Power, starts seventh. Josef Newgarden rolls off fifth while Scott McLaughlin is on the front row in 2nd.
McLaren had 3 of the top 6 speeds on Friday afternoon and came into this weekend with some momentum.
McLaren had all three drivers in the top five in the GMR Grand Prix last month including two on the podium. Alexander Rossi enters having scored a third place run in that GMR Grand Prix and top five in last week’s Indy 500.
Pagenaud Quietly Having Strong Weekend
Entering this weekend, Simon Pagenaud was having a rough start to this season. Marred back in 25th in points with a best result of 15th in Long Beach. He finished 25th in both races last month in Indianapolis and struggled to gain any momentum.
That could soon be changing.
Pagenaud worked his way up into the top 10 before being punted by Scott McLaughlin on Lap 192 last Sunday. That’s the only reason why he was 25th and not in a spot contending for maybe even a top 5.
In Detroit, Pagenaud was 13th and 10th in both practice sessions and backed that up with qualifying his No. 60 Dallara-Honda in eighth.
When scanning the top 13 starting spots, you have all three Penske’s, all 3 McLaren’s, all four Ganassi’s and 2 Andretti’s. The only one not?
Pagenaud.
He has a chance to do something special on Sunday.
Andretti Autosport Has Rough Saturday
Andretti Autosport has been the top team on street courses this season in the NTT INDYCAR SERIES. While they didn’t win St. Pete, they had 3 of their 4 cars qualify in the Fast 6 and if not for late race contact while going for the lead, Romain Grosjean was likely the winner that day.
In Long Beach, they finally scored the win with pole sitter Kyle Kirkwood being victorious. Romain Grosjean gave them a 1-2 result with Colton Herta giving them 3 of the top 4 finishers.
Now, in an inaugural race, would Andretti’s outright speed on these tracks win outright or does bad luck strike?
Unfortunately, bad luck has struck.
Kyle Kirkwood and Colton Herta both crashed in qualifying. Herta also found the wall in Saturday morning’s practice session too. So did Devlin DeFrancesco.
4 crashes in two sessions on the same day.
Ouch.
Kirkwood was third quickest in both practice sessions this weekend. Unfortunately, hitting the wall in the second round of qualifying left him with a 12th place starting spot. The talented American driver said that he was very disappointed with himself with making that mistake. It was a pole winning car that he damaged. He felt like the wall not being rounded in that section cost him there, but also admitted that at the end of the day, it was his fault.
Most figured Herta would be on the limit here all weekend too. Instead, he’s been off. The Andretti Autosport driver crashed in both practice on Saturday morning and in qualifying on Saturday afternoon.
That relegated him to last (27th) in the morning practice and 24th in the starting lineup.
For the driver that enters this weekend 10th in points, this has been a struggle.
DeFrancesco starts 17th.
Romain Grosjean was the lone brightspot in qualifying third.
They enter Sunday’s race on the heels of an abysmal Month of May. That’s the far opposite as they way that they’ve entered it.
They qualified 6-14-15-18- for the GMR Grand Prix and 15-19-21-25 for the Indy 500. They’d finish 9-11-14-17 on the road course and 9-13-28-30. The last two Indy 500’s, they’ve led a combined three laps.
Kirkwood went from ninth in points entering to 12th leaving. Grosjean went from fifth to eighth. Herta remained in 10th while DeFrancesco from 25th to 23rd.
It will be fun to see them with fast cars try to come up through the field on Sunday. Luckily for them, there has been times recently to where starting position didn’t matter on street courses.
7 of the last 12 street races were won from a spot outside the Fast Six including spots of 15th, 16th, 18th, 14th, 16th and 14th since 2021.
RLL’s Struggles Continue
I was curious on how much Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing would respond this weekend on the streets of Detroit. They entered the last race, the Indy 500, with a ton of momentum. Christian Lundgaard won the pole for the GMR Grand Prix. Jack Harvey qualified fourth. Graham Rahal was in eighth.
While they didn’t pick up a win in the race itself, they all spoke to how much of a jolt of momentum that the race gave them.
However, that momentum was short lived. They struggled on the oval at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
3 of their 4 cars qualified in the bottom four spots. Graham Rahal was bumped. It was a dark month for them for the biggest race of the season.
That’s why Detroit was a good reset. They’ve been strong actually on street courses.
Sebring was the turning point last year. Rahal was 4th in Toronto while Lundgaard was 8th. Actually, Rahal had 3 Top-7 finishes on the 5 street courses a year ago while Lundgaard closed out the year on them with a pair of 8th place runs. They started 2023 off with a pair of top 10 finishes in St. Pete too. Rahal was 6th and 12th on street courses this season and this is the site that he last won at in 2017. Lundgaard was 9th and 14th with Harvey 22nd and 13th.
The thing is, they’ve struggled here in Detroit. Lundgaard was 12th and 15th in the pair of practices. Rahal was 16th and 17th while Harvey was 18th and 24th. In qualifying, they were even further off.
Lundgaard starts 18th. Harvey is down in 25th and Rahal in last (27th). That’s 2 of the bottom 3 starters for the second consecutive race.
Rahal hasn’t won in his last 95 starts, but the last time he did, he was him sweeping the weekend over in Belle Isle.
Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix Starting Lineup
Row 1: Alex Palou, Scott McLaughlin
Row 2: Romain Grosjean, Scott Dixon
Row 3: Josef Newgarden, Marcus Ericsson
Row 4: Will Power, Simon Pagenaud
Row 5: Felix Rosenqvist, Pato O’Ward
Row 6: Marcus Armstrong, Kyle Kirkwood
Row 7: Alexander Rossi, Rinus VeeKay
Row 8: Conor Daly, Callum Ilott
Row 9: Devlin DeFrancesco, Christian Lundgaard
Row 10: Benjamin Pedersen R, Agustin Canapino R
Row 11: David Malukas, Santino Ferrucci
Row 12: Helio Castroneves, Colton Herta
Row 13: Jack Harvey, Sting Ray Robb
Row 14: Graham Rahal
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