Scott McLaughlin won pole for this weekend’s Music City Grand Prix with a blistering final lap in the Fast Six session – his first pole of the season and second straight pole around the streets of Nashville.
Qualifying was delayed for over three-and-a-half hours due to heavy rainfall and standing water around the Nashville street circuit. Thankfully, by the rescheduled start time of 5:15pm, the clouds had parted and the track was completely dry as well as green, leaving plenty of room for track evolution.Regardless, McLaughlin was brilliant in all phases of qualifying: He led his group in the first round, and was the only Penske driver that advanced to the Fast Six. Armed with a set of scuffed alternate-compound tyres, the Kiwi put together a blistering final run, taking the top spot with a lap of 1’14.610 to win pole position by three-tenths of a second.
Pato O’Ward qualified second for McLaren, making the front row an all-Chevrolet affair. Colton Herta, now a resident of the Nashville area, will start third, next to championship leader Alex Palou in fourth place.
Palou has an 80-point lead over Nashville native Josef Newgarden, who missed the cut to make the Fast Six and will start ninth. With just five races remaining including this weekend, Palou has an opportunity to virtually put the Astor Challenge Cup, IndyCar’s championship trophy, out of reach to the rest of the field tomorrow.
David Malukas was an excellent fifth-fastest, out-qualifying Romain Grosjean in sixth.
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Will Power had a number of close calls – and even a brush with the wall – over his qualifying session. For his efforts, he could do no better than seventh-fastest, eliminated in the second round of qualifying that was disrupted by a rare clash with the barriers from Scott Dixon.
That left Power in seventh, Kyle Kirkwood in eighth, and Alexander Rossi in tenth behind the aforementioned Newgarden. With the deletion of his two fastest laps, Dixon will start 12th.
One driver who was satisfied to make the second round of qualifying was the debuting Linus Lundqvist, who replaced Simon Pagenaud this weekend as the Frenchman recovers from concussion symptoms lingering after a practice accident in Mid-Ohio.
Lundqvist, the reigning Indy NXT (Indy Lights) champion, wasn’t able to secure the budget for a full-season ride due to a slash in the champion’s prize fund – but he made up for the lost opportunities quickly, advancing out of his group in round one, and qualifying a solid 11th, best of all the rookies including F2 alumnus Marcus Armstrong. Lundqvist greatly outclassed his fellow Indy NXT graduates Sting Ray Robb, and Benjamin Pedersen – the latter of whom brought out a red flag just one minute into the first group qualifying session.
Further down the order, Toronto street race winner Christian Lundgaard will start 13th, and Marcus Ericsson, a previous winner in Nashville, will start a lowly 22nd.
Typically around a technical street circuit, McLaughlin would have a prime opportunity to convert pole position into a victory, but the two previous iterations of this event have been anything but routine.
Currently, the weather outlook for Sunday’s 80-lap race has only a minor threat of thunderstorms later in the afternoon. The green flag for the third annual Music City Grand Prix is scheduled for 11:30am local time, 17:30pm UK time.
Music City Grand Prix qualifying results
Position | Car | Driver | Team | Engine |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 3 | Scott McLaughlin | Penske | Chevrolet |
2 | 5 | Pato O’Ward | McLaren | Chevrolet |
3 | 26 | Colton Herta | Andretti | Honda |
4 | 10 | Alex Palou | Ganassi | Honda |
5 | 18 | David Malukas | Coyne/HMD | Honda |
6 | 28 | Romain Grosjean | Andretti | Honda |
7 | 12 | Will Power | Penske | Chevrolet |
8 | 27 | Kyle Kirkwood | Andretti | Honda |
9 | 2 | Josef Newgarden | Penske | Chevrolet |
10 | 7 | Alexander Rossi | McLaren | Chevrolet |
11 | 60 | Linus Lundqvist | Meyer Shank | Honda |
12 | 9 | Scott Dixon | Ganassi | Honda |
13 | 45 | Christian Lundgaard | RLL | Honda |
14 | 6 | Felix Rosenqvist | McLaren | Chevrolet |
15 | 15 | Graham Rahal | RLL | Honda |
16 | 11 | Marcus Armstrong | Ganassi | Honda |
17 | 06 | Helio Castroneves | Meyer Shank | Honda |
18 | 77 | Callum Ilott | Juncos Hollinger | Chevrolet |
19 | 21 | Rinus VeeKay | Carpenter | Chevrolet |
20 | 30 | Jack Harvey | RLL | Honda |
21 | 14 | Santino Ferrucci | Foyt | Chevrolet |
22 | 8 | Marcus Ericsson | Ganassi | Honda |
23 | 78 | Agustin Canapino | Juncos Hollinger | Chevrolet |
24 | 51 | Sting Ray Robb | Coyne/RWR | Honda |
25 | 55 | Benjamin Pedersen | Foyt | Chevrolet |
26 | 29 | Devlin DeFrancesco | Andretti | Honda |
27 | 20 | Ryan Hunter-Reay | Carpenter | Chevrolet |
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Tiaki Porangi
6th August 2023, 6:50
So happy to see how Scottie has settled into Indy Car. I wonder if he could make the transition to F1 as well? His performances in V8 SuperCars were always fantastic!
As an aside – also interesting to see how Shane van Gisbergen went to Chicago, his first NASCAR outing, and won the race! Seems the SuperCars background is a great one to have for other racing series.
@Keithcollantine any chance of extending your coverage here to WRC, SuperCars, and/or MotoGP?
Asd
6th August 2023, 11:53
WRC is not racing and MotoGP is such a different sport that I dont think Keith has ever followed it.
All top 10 IndyCar drivers could get into a RedBull and start winning F1 races tomorrow. So what? F1 is a wasteland for talent, I wouldnt want to go there just to drive around in a Williams.
Don
6th August 2023, 14:51
Scott has done a great job Indy Car. He’s obviously very talented, has tons of experience on street courses where he does well.
van Gisbergen has tons of experience on street courses, and SuperCars are somewhat similar to a NASCAR. NASCAR has never raced on a street course so he had an advantage even though it was his first outing. It will be a far different story for him on ovals.