IndyCar Harvest GP: VeeKay on pole, Newgarden second, Dixon 12th

In Group 1, Josef Newgarden led Team Penske-Chevrolet teammate Will Power by a tenth of a second and Meyer Shank Racing-Honda’s Jack Harvey by 1.5sec on the harder compound tires – and these proved to be the definitive times for Group 1.

The red flag flew for Takuma Sato spinning his Rahal Letterman Lanigan-Honda at Turn 4 on his out-lap on the Firestone reds, and with 5mins of guaranteed time elapsed and not enough time to retrieve his car before the checkers, the session didn’t restart.

As a result, Newgarden guaranteed himself a front-row start, Power and Harvey (the front row from the GMR Grand Prix of Indianapolis in July) lining up on the second and third rows.

The big news was that Scott Dixon was only sixth fastest on the harder compound, so will only be starting on the sixth row. Sato, had his best two laps deleted for causing the red, and will start from the back.

Apparently learning the lesson from Group 1’s misfortune, Helio Castroneves went straight out on reds in Group 2, but his best effort 0.37sec behind the best on blacks, Colton Herta (Andretti Autosport), and was also behind Max Chilton (Carlin) and Marco Andretti (Andretti Herta Autosport).

Felix Rosenqvist’s Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda guaranteed Group 2’s leader would be on pole when he lowered the top mark to 1min10.3, and then the times continued to tumble.

As the laps dropped into the 69s, suddenly it was Ed Carpenter Racing-Chevrolet’s Rinus VeeKay who sprung to the top, and even Herta’s and Andretti’s last gasp efforts couldn’t usurp him.

This morning’s pacesetter Alex Palou will roll off on the ninth row, ahead of Castroneves whose tire tactics didn’t work out.

Group 1

Cla	Driver	Team	Laps	Time	Gap
1	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske	4	1'10.470
2	Will Power	Team Penske	4	1'10.568	0.098
3	Jack Harvey	Meyer Shank Racing	4	1'10.623	0.152
4	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	4	1'10.650	0.179
5	Patricio O'Ward	Arrow McLaren SP	5	1'10.729	0.258
6	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	5	1'10.895	0.424
7	Conor Daly	Ed Carpenter Racing	4	1'10.937	0.466
8	Sébastien Bourdais	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	4	1'10.958	0.488
9	James Hinchcliffe	Andretti Autosport	4	1'10.963	0.492
10	Santino Ferrucci	Dale Coyne Racing with Vasser Sullivan	5	1'11.004	0.533
11	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske	5	1'11.048	0.578
12	Takuma Sato	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	4	1'14.898	4.427
View full results

Group 2

Cla	Driver	Team	Laps	Time	Gap
1	Rinus van Kalmthout	Ed Carpenter Racing	8	1'09.690
2	Colton Herta	Andretti Harding Steinbrenner Autosport	8	1'09.704	0.014
3	Marco Andretti	Andretti Herta Autosport with Marco & Curb-Agajani	7	1'09.714	0.023
4	Felix Rosenqvist	Chip Ganassi Racing	8	1'09.800	0.110
5	Max Chilton	Carlin	8	1'09.819	0.129
6	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	7	1'09.883	0.192
7	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	8	1'09.987	0.296
8	Marcus Ericsson	Chip Ganassi Racing	8	1'10.001	0.311
9	Alex Palou	Dale Coyne Racing with Team Goh	8	1'10.032	0.342
10	Helio Castroneves	Arrow McLaren SP	7	1'10.396	0.706
11	Sage Karam	Dreyer & Reinbold Racing	6	1'10.622	0.932
12	Charlie Kimball	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	8	1'10.750	1.059
13	Dalton Kellett	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	8	1'10.995	1.305
View full results