IndyCar Detroit GP starting lineup: Alex Palou on pole while Malukas, Schumacher crash

The Spaniard took pole for the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix after two red-flag incidents shaped the earlier rounds

Alex Palou dished out a controlled qualifying performance to take pole for the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix.

The fourth driver to go out in the single-car, single-lap Fast Six, the Spaniard propelled his #10 Chip Ganassi Racing Honda to a quick lap of 1m01.9017s around the 1.645-mile, nine-turn street circuit. It is Palou’s 16th career pole.

“I felt really good with my lap,” Palou said. “I thought there was not much more margin from my side, so I tried and put everything together. Yeah, so happy that we made it to the pole and we sticked it there. Happy to get the #10 Honda Honda here in Detroit on pole. Good step, but the big day is tomorrow.”

Andretti Global’s Will Power ended up second by 0.2232s, with Team Penske’s Scott McLaughlin third.

Six-time IndyCar Series champion Scott Dixon put his #9 Chip Ganassi Racing Honda fourth, with Arrow McLaren’s Christian Lundgaard fifth. Kyle Kirkwood finished sixth in the #27 Andretti Global Honda.

Fast Six

Alex Palou, Chip Ganassi Racing

Photo by: Penske Entertainment

As a byproduct of going fastest in the Fast 12, McLaughlin opted to go out first on a set of softer alternates. Power, Kirkwood, Palou, Lundgaard, and Dixon followed the same order as they concluded in the Fast 12, with all opting for a set of used alternates in an attempt to retain heat in the tires.

McLaughlin went out first and nearly bent it before even taking the green flag, but kept it together to nail a 1m02.4559s.

The next to go out was Power, who propelled around with a controlled run at 1m02.124s to dethrone McLaughlin from the top spot.

Kirkwood hustled around on his warmup ahead of the alternate start line and immediately had a brief lockup in his opening corner and again moments later in the hairpin. In the end, the messy lap hurt him as he was left hitting a 1m03.030s lap.

Reigning and four-time IndyCar Series champion Palou went out next and calmly dished out a controlled flyer of 1m01.9017s lap to knock Power from provisional pole.

Lundgaard, equipped with a fresh engine after his powerplant went up in smoke in second practice on Saturday morning, couldn’t will his #7 Arrow McLaren Chevrolet to a challenging performance. In the end, his lap of 1m02.787s put him fourth, with Dixon still to go out.

The final driver to go out, Dixon nearly drew level in the early part of the lap but ended up sliding to a 1m02.787s to slot fourth, pushing Lundgaard to fifth.

Fast 12

The top spot was a rotation as seven different drivers held the top spot with competitive times at one point during the session, with McLaughlin’s 1m01.333s flyer with roughly a 15s to go enough to hold it.

Power and Kirkwood took second and third, respectively. Palou held fourth, followed by Lundgaard, and Dixon.

Arrow McLaren’s Pato O’Ward was the first to miss the transfer spot by just 0.0480s. Marcus Armstrong came away eighth in the #66 Meyer Shank Racing Honda, ahead of the #21 ECR Chevrolet of Christian Rasmussen in ninth.

Andretti Global’s Marcus Ericsson, who slapped the wall during the session but continued on, was 10th.

Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing’s Louis Foster and Graham Rahal ended up 11th and 12th, respectively.

Groups

In Group 1, O’Ward set the fastest time after running six laps on the harder primary tires with 1m02.263s, which came with 3m15s left in the session. With just over 2m36s to go, however, Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing rookie Mick Schumacher pounded the outside wall in Turn 7, putting an end to his day and bringing out the red flag.

After the brief stoppage for cleanup, all others competitors went out on the softer alternate compound, but only Armstrong mustered enough pace to alter the standings prior to Schumacher’s crash.

Armstrong delivered a last-gasp run to vault to the top spot with a 1m02.230s, edging O’Ward by 0.0323s. Dixon, Lundgaard, Foster, and Ericsson also transferred through to the next round.

Arrow McLaren’s Nolan Siegel narrowly missed the cut by 0.0370s and was the first driver out. Dale Coye Racing rookie Dennis Hauger was eighth in the group, followed by Kyffin Simpson (Chip Ganassi Racing), Caio Collet (AJ Foyt Racing), Josef Newgarden (Team Penske), and Schumacher.

The second group was initially led by Palou, nailing a 1m01.581s flyer with less than 1m30s in the session, but Kirkwood fired back with a 1m01.488s run with less than 30s remaining.

In the final seconds, David Malukas was on a quick lap before tapping the inside wall in Turn 7 and violently hitting the outside wall. The vicious impact saw the right front of his #12 Team Penske Chevrolet hit first before slapping the rest of the right side. The incident put an end to the session, with Kirkwood, Palou, McLaughlin, Power, Rahal, and Rasmussen advancing.

ECR’s Alexander Rossi was the first driver out, followed by reigning Indianapolis 500 winner Felix Rosenqvist, who was held up near the end and unable to make one final run with his #60 Meyer Shank Racing Honda. Juncos Hollinger Racing’s Rinus VeeKay was ninth in the second group, followed by Dale Coyne Racing’s Romain Grosjean, Malukas, Santino Ferrucci (AJ Foyt Racing), and Sting Ray Robb (Juncos Hollinger Racing).

Photos from Detroit - Saturday

GRID

All Stats

Cla	Driver	#	Time	Mph
1	A. Palou Chip Ganassi Racing	10	1'01.9017	95.668
2	W. Power Andretti Global	26	+0.2232 1'02.1249	95.324
3	S. McLaughlin Team Penske	3	+0.5542 1'02.4559	94.819
4	S. Dixon Chip Ganassi Racing	9	+0.7068 1'02.6085	94.588
5	C. Lundgaard Arrow McLaren	7	+0.8853 1'02.7870	94.319
6	K. Kirkwood Andretti Global	27	+1.1286 1'03.0303	93.955
7	P. O'Ward Arrow McLaren	5	1'01.5966	96.142
8	M. Armstrong Meyer Shank Racing with Curb-Agajanian	66	1'01.6973	95.985
9	C. Rasmussen Ed Carpenter Racing	21	1'01.7122	95.962
10	M. Ericsson Andretti Global	28	1'01.7770	95.861
11	L. Foster Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	45	1'01.8340	95.773
12	G. Rahal Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	15	+0.0813 1'01.9830	95.542
13	N. Siegel Arrow McLaren	6	+0.8639 1'02.7656	94.351
14	A. Rossi Ed Carpenter Racing	20	+0.2597 1'02.1614	95.268
15	D. Hauger Dale Coyne Racing	19	+0.9232 1'02.8249	94.262
16	F. Rosenqvist Meyer Shank Racing with Curb-Agajanian	60	+0.2846 1'02.1863	95.230
17	K. Simpson Chip Ganassi Racing	8	+1.4382 1'03.3399	93.496
18	R. van Kalmthout Juncos Hollinger Racing	76	+0.3783 1'02.2800	95.087
19	C. Collet A.J. Foyt Enterprises	4	+1.4423 1'03.3440	93.490
20	R. Grosjean Dale Coyne Racing	18	+0.4174 1'02.3191	95.027
21	J. Newgarden Team Penske	2	+1.5017 1'03.4034	93.402
22	S. Ferrucci A.J. Foyt Enterprises	14	+0.5097 1'02.4114	94.887
23	M. Schumacher Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	47	+5.5476 1'07.4493	87.799
24	R. Robb Sting Juncos Hollinger Racing	77	+0.8961 1'02.7978	94.303
25	D. Malukas Team Penske	12	+2.7101 1'04.6118	91.655
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