Laguna Seca IndyCar: Herta beats title contenders to pole

Herta, who earlier this afternoon was confirmed for Andretti Autosport next year, lapped the 2.238-mile WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca in 1min10.141sec, beating Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda’s Scott Dixon by just 0.0426sec, to take his and Harding Steinbrenner Racing’s third pole of the season, and second in a row.

Alexander Rossi was only 0.0274sec further behind, and will start alongside Team Penske-Chevrolet’s points leader Josef Newgarden who blew his last effort with an off at Turn 2.

James Hinchcliffe did a fine job to get his Arrow Schmidt Peterson Motorsports-Honda through to Q3 and will start fifth, on the same row as Simon Pagenaud’s Penske, which also had a wild moment through the Corkscrew on his final shot.

Teammate Will Power got knocked out at the end of Q2 by last-gasp efforts from Rossi and Pagenaud, and will line up seventh, alongside Graham Rahal in the Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing-Honda, while another driver expected to excel was Ryan Hunter-Reay who was fastest yesterday but will start only ninth.

Max Chilton excelled with 10th place in his Carlin Racing-Chevrolet, ahead of Marcus Ericsson in the second Arrow SPM-Honda and Santino Ferrucci’s Dale Coyne Racing-Honda.

One of the pole favorites, Felix Rosenqvist in the second Ganassi car, lost his two fastest laps and was not allowed to advance from Q1 Group 2 as punishment for qualifying interference.

He spun out of the uphill Turn 6, although he didn’t bring out a red flag and was able to restart without aid. His best lap would have put him top, and even his third best lap would have left him fourth and therefore advancing. Rosenqvist was disgusted and described the penalty as “unfair”.

Other disappointments within that group was RLLR’s Takuma Sato which failed by hundredths of a second to get through to the Top 12, while Marco Andretti who had looked strong in practice also failed to advance.

Conor Daly’s last-gasp effort left him just outside the Top six in Q1 Group 1, while Spencer Pigot was also disappointed not to get into the top half of the grid in the Ed Carpenter Racing-Chevrolet #21.

Firestone Fast Six:

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Time	Gap
1	88	Colton Herta	Harding Racing	1'10.1405
2	9	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'10.1831	0.0426
3	27	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	1'10.2105	0.070
4	2	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske	1'10.6719	0.5314
5	5	James Hinchcliffe	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	1'10.8003	0.6598
6	22	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske	1'10.8616	0.7211
View full results

Q2:

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Time	Gap
1	88	Colton Herta	Harding Racing	1'09.9828
2	9	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'10.0845	0.1017
3	27	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	1'10.2332	0.2504
4	2	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske	1'10.2674	0.2846
5	5	James Hinchcliffe	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	1'10.4387	0.4559
6	22	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske	1'10.6031	0.6203
7	12	Will Power	Team Penske	1'10.6086	0.6258
8	15	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	1'10.6296	0.6468
9	28	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	1'10.6919	0.7091
10	59	Max Chilton	Carlin	1'10.7257	0.7429
11	7	Marcus Ericsson	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	1'11.1666	1.1838
12	19	Santino Ferrucci	Dale Coyne Racing	1'12.4137	2.4309
View full results

Q1 Group 2:

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Time	Gap
1	88	Colton Herta	Harding Racing	1'10.2892
2	12	Will Power	Team Penske	1'10.4489	0.1597
3	7	Marcus Ericsson	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	1'10.5296	0.2404
4	10	Felix Rosenqvist	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'10.5649	0.2757
5	5	James Hinchcliffe	Schmidt Peterson Motorsports	1'10.6462	0.3570
6	19	Santino Ferrucci	Dale Coyne Racing	1'10.7253	0.4361
7	15	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	1'10.7920	0.5028
8	30	Takuma Sato	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	1'10.8393	0.5501
9	20	Ed Jones	Ed Carpenter Racing	1'10.9806	0.6914
10	23	Charlie Kimball	Carlin	1'10.9865	0.6973
11	98	Marco Andretti	Andretti Autosport	1'11.0527	0.7635
12	60	Jack Harvey	Meyer Shank Racing	1'11.2710	0.9818
View full results

Q1 Group 1:

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Time	Gap
1	2	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske	1'10.3081
2	27	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	1'10.3097	0.0016
3	9	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'10.3256	0.0175
4	22	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske	1'10.4809	0.1728
5	59	Max Chilton	Carlin	1'10.5276	0.2195
6	28	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	1'10.5860	0.2779
7	25	Conor Daly	Andretti Autosport	1'10.7787	0.4706
8	21	Spencer Pigot	Ed Carpenter Racing	1'10.8275	0.5194
9	26	Zach Veach	Andretti Autosport	1'10.8407	0.5326
10	18	Sébastien Bourdais	Dale Coyne Racing	1'11.0095	0.7014
11	14	Tony Kanaan	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	1'11.2454	0.9373
12	4	Matheus Leist	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	1'11.5180	1.2099
View full results