St Pete IndyCar qualifying results: McLaughlin takes shock pole
Scott McLaughlin took pole position on Saturday for the opening round of the NTT IndyCar Series at St Petersburg in Florida, ahead of Team Penske teammate Will Power.
Photo by: Phillip Abbott / Motorsport Images
McLaughlin will start ahead of Power and Andretti Autosport’s Colton Herta after qualifying, which is split into four segments of knock-out qualifying which culminates in the Firestone Fast Six.
How the grid lines up for St Petersburg IndyCar race
What happened in Q1?
In the first of the split sessions of 13 cars, Herta set the pace by 0.3098s from Graham Rahal, Rinus Veekay, Scott Dixon, Kyle Kirkwood and Josef Newgarden.
Falling at the first hurdle were Alex Rossi, Christian Lundgaard, Helio Castroneves, Callum Ilott, Felix Rosenqvist, Jack Harvey and Tatiana Calderon.
St Petersburg IndyCar Q1, Group 1 results: Herta fastest from Rahal
Cla | Driver | Team | Laps | Time | Gap | Interval | Mph |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 |
Colton Herta
|
Andretti Autosport | 7 | 59.466 | 108.969 | ||
2 |
Graham Rahal
|
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing | 8 | 59.776 | 0.309 | 0.309 | 108.405 |
3 |
Rinus van Kalmthout
|
Ed Carpenter Racing | 8 | 59.804 | 0.338 | 0.028 | 108.353 |
4 |
Scott Dixon
|
Chip Ganassi Racing | 8 | 59.810 | 0.344 | 0.006 | 108.342 |
5 |
Kyle Kirkwood
|
A.J. Foyt Enterprises | 7 | 59.853 | 0.387 | 0.042 | 108.265 |
6 |
Josef Newgarden
|
Team Penske | 8 | 59.914 | 0.448 | 0.061 | 108.154 |
7 |
Alexander Rossi
|
Andretti Autosport | 7 | 59.993 | 0.526 | 0.078 | 108.012 |
8 |
Christian Lundgaard
|
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing | 7 | 1'00.027 | 0.561 | 0.034 | 107.950 |
9 |
Helio Castroneves
|
Meyer Shank Racing | 8 | 1'00.142 | 0.676 | 0.115 | 107.744 |
10 |
Callum Ilott
|
Juncos Hollinger Racing | 6 | 1'00.212 | 0.745 | 0.069 | 107.620 |
11 |
Felix Rosenqvist
|
Arrow McLaren SP | 7 | 1'00.391 | 0.925 | 0.179 | 107.299 |
12 |
Jack Harvey
|
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing | 7 | 1'00.533 | 1.067 | 0.141 | 107.049 |
13 |
Tatiana Calderon
|
A.J. Foyt Enterprises | 8 | 1'00.939 | 1.472 | 0.405 | 106.336 |
View full results |
In the second session, Power topped it by almost two tenths from McLaughlin, Romain Grosjean, Simon Pagenaud and Marcus Ericsson.
Knocked out at this point were Dalton Kellett, Pato O’Ward (who hit the wall on the exit of Turn 9), rookie Devlin DeFrancesco, Conor Daly, Takuma Sato, David Malukas and Jimmie Johnson.
St Petersburg IndyCar Q1, Group 2 results: Power fastest from McLaughlin
Cla | Driver | Team | Laps | Time | Gap | Interval | Mph |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 |
Will Power
|
Team Penske | 6 | 59.392 | 109.104 | ||
2 |
Scott McLaughlin
|
Team Penske | 6 | 59.584 | 0.191 | 0.191 | 108.753 |
3 |
Romain Grosjean
|
Andretti Autosport | 6 | 59.626 | 0.233 | 0.042 | 108.676 |
4 |
Simon Pagenaud
|
Meyer Shank Racing | 7 | 59.703 | 0.311 | 0.077 | 108.536 |
5 |
Marcus Ericsson
|
Chip Ganassi Racing | 8 | 59.881 | 0.488 | 0.177 | 108.214 |
6 |
Alex Palou
|
Chip Ganassi Racing | 9 | 59.895 | 0.502 | 0.014 | 108.188 |
7 |
Dalton Kellett
|
A.J. Foyt Enterprises | 8 | 59.952 | 0.559 | 0.056 | 108.086 |
8 |
Patricio O'Ward
|
Arrow McLaren SP | 6 | 1'00.002 | 0.609 | 0.050 | 107.996 |
9 |
Devlin DeFrancesco
|
Andretti Autosport | 8 | 1'00.085 | 0.692 | 0.082 | 107.847 |
10 |
Conor Daly
|
Ed Carpenter Racing | 8 | 1'00.192 | 0.799 | 0.107 | 107.655 |
11 |
Takuma Sato
|
Dale Coyne Racing | 8 | 1'00.293 | 0.900 | 0.100 | 107.475 |
12 |
David Malukas
|
Dale Coyne Racing with HMD | 8 | 1'00.460 | 1.067 | 0.167 | 107.178 |
13 |
Jimmie Johnson
|
Chip Ganassi Racing | 8 | 1'01.027 | 1.634 | 0.567 | 106.182 |
View full results |
What happened in Q2?
In the 12-car session that followed, Power set the pace, 0.0585s ahead of Herta. McLaughlin was a tenth back in third, ahead of Grosjean, Pagenaud and Veekay.
Knocked out at this point were Dixon, Ericsson, Newgarden, Palou, Rahal and Kirkwood.
St Petersburg IndyCar Q2 results: Power fastest from Herta
Cla | Driver | Team | Laps | Time | Gap | Interval | Mph |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 |
Will Power
|
Team Penske | 7 | 59.346 | 109.189 | ||
2 |
Colton Herta
|
Andretti Autosport | 6 | 59.405 | 0.058 | 0.058 | 109.082 |
3 |
Scott McLaughlin
|
Team Penske | 7 | 59.515 | 0.169 | 0.110 | 108.879 |
4 |
Romain Grosjean
|
Andretti Autosport | 6 | 59.555 | 0.209 | 0.040 | 108.805 |
5 |
Simon Pagenaud
|
Meyer Shank Racing | 7 | 59.588 | 0.241 | 0.032 | 108.747 |
6 |
Rinus van Kalmthout
|
Ed Carpenter Racing | 8 | 59.623 | 0.276 | 0.035 | 108.683 |
7 |
Scott Dixon
|
Chip Ganassi Racing | 7 | 59.757 | 0.411 | 0.134 | 108.438 |
8 |
Marcus Ericsson
|
Chip Ganassi Racing | 8 | 59.824 | 0.477 | 0.066 | 108.318 |
9 |
Josef Newgarden
|
Team Penske | 7 | 59.886 | 0.539 | 0.062 | 108.205 |
10 |
Alex Palou
|
Chip Ganassi Racing | 7 | 59.958 | 0.611 | 0.072 | 108.075 |
11 |
Graham Rahal
|
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing | 8 | 59.987 | 0.640 | 0.028 | 108.023 |
12 |
Kyle Kirkwood
|
A.J. Foyt Enterprises | 6 | 1'00.261 | 0.915 | 0.274 | 107.531 |
View full results |
What happened in the Fast Six?
McLaughlin scored his first-ever IndyCar pole, his previous best start in the series being fifth, taking the top spot by 0.1237s from Power.
“Last year was P20,” reflected Power, who set a track record in Q2. “I was very happy until the last run, I was P1, P1… P2.”
Herta was third, two tenths off pole, ahead of Veekay, Grosjean and Pagenaud.
St Petersburg IndyCar Q3 results: McLaughlin takes pole
Cla | Driver | Team | Laps | Time | Gap | Interval | Mph |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 |
Scott McLaughlin
|
Team Penske | 3 | 59.482 | 108.940 | ||
2 |
Will Power
|
Team Penske | 4 | 59.605 | 0.123 | 0.123 | 108.714 |
3 |
Colton Herta
|
Andretti Autosport | 4 | 59.710 | 0.228 | 0.104 | 108.524 |
4 |
Rinus van Kalmthout
|
Ed Carpenter Racing | 4 | 59.810 | 0.328 | 0.099 | 108.343 |
5 |
Romain Grosjean
|
Andretti Autosport | 4 | 59.811 | 0.329 | 0.001 | 108.340 |
6 |
Simon Pagenaud
|
Meyer Shank Racing | 3 | 1'00.204 | 0.722 | 0.392 | 107.634 |
View full results |
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