Indy GP IndyCar: Power beats Harvey, takes 58th pole

Power turned a 1min10.178sec, an average speed of 125.116mph, to nudge down Harvey’s Meyer Shank car by 0.1874sec which wasn’t quite fast enough on its second run in Firestone Fast Six to hold on to top spot.

It was at this same venue last May that Harvey and MSR scored their first and so far only podium finish.

This was Power's fourth pole for the Grand Prix of Indianapolis, an event he has won three times.

Colton Herta’s Andretti Harding Steinbrenner Autosport-Honda entry was best of Michael Andretti’s cars, beating Graham Rahal’s Rahal Letterman Lanigan-Honda by 0.065sec.

Indy Lights champion Oliver Askew was outstanding for Arrow McLaren SP-Chevrolet in his first road course qualifying session in the series. He topped Group 2, but took a little too much life out of his tires to truly shine in Firestone Fast 6.

Nonetheless, he will start ahead of defending champion Josef Newgarden who only scraped through the first two rounds of qualifying, and then blew his one attempt at a flyer in the final segment of qualifying, pulling into the pits after abandoning the lap.

In Q2, Scott Dixon missed out on advancing to the Firestone Fast Six by just 0.057sec and will start from seventh, two places ahead of his Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda teammate Felix Rosenqvist, who took pole here last year.

The pair will be separated by Conor Daly who made an excellent impression in Ed Carpenter Racing’s U.S. Air Force car. The same was true of Max Chilton in the sole Carlin entry, who outpaced Andretti Autosport’s Alexander Rossi and Ryan Hunter-Reay for 10th.

In Q1 Group 1, Patricio O’Ward was just 0.2sec slower than teammate Askew who topped the group, but that was enough to leave him in seventh, preventing him from reaching Round 2.

However, O’Ward still outpaced the two Dale Coyne Racing cars of Santino Ferrucci and rookie Alex Palou, two Andretti Autosport cars, and the Rahal Letterman Lanigan entry of Takuma Sato.

A bigger shock was in store in Q1 Group 2, when three-time GP of Indy winner Simon Pagenaud missed the cut, finishing 10th out of 13th. That means the Team Penske driver will roll off from 20th tomorrow.

Meanwhile, series sophomore Marcus Ericsson, who put his Ganassi car third fastest this morning, fell just 0.03sec short of making it into the Top 12.

Given their pace this morning, there was also some disappointment that Spencer Pigot of RLL with Citrone/Buhl Autosport and Ed Carpenter Racing’s Rinus VeeKay failed to advance from Q1, especially in light of respective teammates Rahal and Askew reaching the Fast 6.

The GMR Grand Prix of Indianapolis begins at 12 noon on Saturday, local (Eastern) time.

For a preview, facts, and schedule for the event click here. 

Qualifying results:

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Time	Gap	Mph
1	12	Will Power	Team Penske	1'10.177		125.116
2	60	Jack Harvey	Meyer Shank Racing	1'10.365	0.187	124.783
3	88	Colton Herta	Andretti Harding Steinbrenner Autosport	1'10.519	0.341	124.510
4	15	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	1'10.584	0.406	124.396
5	7	Oliver Askew	Arrow McLaren SP	1'10.840	0.662	123.946
6	1	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske
7	9	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'10.199	0.021	125.079
8	20	Conor Daly	Ed Carpenter Racing	1'10.216	0.039	125.047
9	10	Felix Rosenqvist	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'10.231	0.053	125.022
10	59	Max Chilton	Carlin	1'10.305	0.127	124.889
11	27	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	1'10.342	0.164	124.823
12	28	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	1'10.576	0.398	124.410
13	5	Patricio O'Ward	Arrow McLaren SP	1'10.733	0.555	124.134
14	8	Marcus Ericsson	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'10.628	0.450	124.318
15	18	Santino Ferrucci	Dale Coyne Racing with Vasser Sullivan	1'10.790	0.612	124.034
16	45	Spencer Pigot	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing with Citrone/Buhl A	1'10.635	0.457	124.307
17	30	Takuma Sato	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	1'10.885	0.707	123.868
18	21	Rinus van Kalmthout	Ed Carpenter Racing	1'10.707	0.529	124.180
19	29	James Hinchcliffe	Andretti Autosport	1'11.147	0.969	123.411
20	22	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske	1'10.743	0.565	124.115
21	55	Alex Palou	Dale Coyne Racing with Team Goh	1'11.181	1.003	123.352
22	26	Zach Veach	Andretti Autosport	1'11.276	1.098	123.188
23	24	Sage Karam	Dreyer & Reinbold Racing	1'11.777	1.599	122.328
24	4	Charlie Kimball	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	1'11.402	1.224	122.970
25	98	Marco Andretti	Andretti Herta Autosport with Marco & Curb-Agajani	1'12.051	1.873	121.863
26	14	Dalton Kellett	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	1'11.587	1.409	122.653
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