Mid-Ohio IndyCar: O’Ward takes pole, bad day for Power, Newgarden

Firestone Fast Six

Pato O’Ward was the first driver to set a representative time on used reds, a 67.0852sec, before pitting immediately to grab another set of worn reds. His time withstood the first efforts by Scott McLaughlin of Team Penske-Chevrolet and his own teammate Felix Rosenqvist. Then he lowered the mark still further to 66.7054, a brilliant lap of 121.861mph around the 2.238-mile course in Lexington, OH. that ensured he was over 0.13sec ahead of McLaughlin, and half a second up on Rosenqvist, who in the previous two segments had looked faster than the 2018 Indy Lights champ. In fact, Rosenqvist was sent to the outside of the second row by Andretti Autosport-Honda’s Colton Herta.

The result means O’Ward is the ninth different polesitter in nine races in the 2022 NTT IndyCar Series.

Scott Dixon was the fastest of the Chip Ganassi Racing-Hondas at the track where he has won six times, albeit 0.7sec off the ultimate pace, while Simon Pagenaud’s decision to run two sets of reds on his Meyer Shank Racing-Honda in Q2 helped get him into the Fast Six but obviously hampered him in the final shootout.

Q2

Scott McLaughlin, Simon Pagenaud and Callum Ilott started this session on Firestone’s alternates, and sure enough they went to the top, perhaps surprisingly with Ilott at the top initially, before McLaughlin beat him by 0.12sec. However, while he was still on primaries David Malukas was able to send the Dale Coyne Racing w/HMD-Honda to the top of the speed charts with a 67.1309sec.

Then Pagenaud and Alexander Rossi each then took turns at the top, before Colton Herta ducked down to 66.7953sec, and was then shaded by Scott Dixon – by a mere 0.0007sec!

The times continued to tumble, with the AMSP cars of Felix Rosenqvist and Pato O’Ward again 0.2sec apart, pushing Dixon down to third, before McLaughlin launched the #3 Penske-Chevrolet to the top of the times with a 66.5341.

Herta and Pagenaud completed the top six, but defending champion Alex Palou was pushed out of the top six.

Malukas was disappointed that O’Ward wasn’t penalized for holding him up, leaving him eighth, although just ahead of the driver who beat him to the Indy Lights title, Kyle Kirkwood. The AJ Foyt Racing-Chevy driver was ninth, but could be happy with being able to beat two surprise non-graduates to the Firestone Fast Six, Rinus VeeKay of Ed Carpenter Racing-Chevrolet who has looked strong this weekend, and the man who Kirkwood will replace at Andretti Autosport next year, Rossi.

Q1 Group 2

Josef Newgarden and Felix Rosenqvist were the fastest drivers on primaries, but somehow Newgarden couldn’t summon up the speed to remain in the top six on the alternate compounds. Rosenqvist could, however, and he delivered a 66.5379sec to edge Arrow McLaren SP-Chevrolet teammate Pato O’Ward by 0.2237sec. Behind these two were Colton Herta (Andretti Autosport), six-time Mid-Ohio winner Scott Dixon, his Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda teammate Alex Palou, and a great effort from Kyle Kirkwood of AJ Foyt Racing-Chevrolet.

Q1 Group 1

On the harder Firestone primaries, Team Penske-Chevrolet’s Will Power set the fastest time turning a 67.5559, 120.327mph, beating Rinus VeeKay of Ed Carpenter Racing-Chevrolet by 0.3172sec, turning just 3 laps before ducking into the pits before pitting for the alternate tires.

However, an incident between Power and Helio Castroneves of Meyer Shank Racing-Honda, who started the session on reds, was under Steward’s review because Power was seen weaving to get the shine off his tires on his out lap as he made the run down to Turn 2. He had accidentally impeded his former teammate, and sure enough, Power had his best laps taken away and will start only 21^st. According to Power, Castroneves walked down pitlane to apologize for causing him a penalty since the MSR car wasn’t on a strong lap.

With their first truly representative times on reds, the times ducked into the 66s, and Power led the way but alas, in vain.

That left teammate Scott McLaughlin at the top of the group, ahead of VeeKay, the MSR car of Simon Pagenaud, Alexander Rossi of Andretti Autosport-Honda, Callum Ilott’s Juncos Hollinger Racing-Chevy, and David Malukas of Dale Coyne Racing with HMD-Honda, who has impressed throughout the weekend.

On the outside looking in were a disappointed Marcus Ericsson, Castroneves, Romain Grosjean and of course, Power.