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| Simon Pagenaud looks to make history again in Iowa |
Will Power extended his top ten starting streak at Iowa to 12 consecutive races after ending up on the front row for race two. Power ended up 0.0324 seconds slower than his Team Penske teammate. It is the first time Penske has swept the front row this season. Power suffered an accident in race one and it is the fourth time in five races he has not finished in the top ten. This matches his worst start since 2013.
After starting on pole position for race one, Conor Daly will start on the inside of row two for race two. Prior to this weekend, Daly's best starting position at Iowa was 16th. He had never started in the top five in his IndyCar career prior to this weekend. Daly ended up finishing eighth in race one. Prior to last night, Daly had only finished in the top ten after starting in the top ten once. That was going from tenth to sixth in the second Belle Isle race in 2015. Daly picked up fastest lap last night.
Ryan Hunter-Reay will start fourth for the second Iowa race and it is only the second time Hunter-Reay has started in the top five at Iowa. Last night was the fourth time in five Iowa races he has finished outside the top fifteen. He had three victories, four podium finishes and seven top ten finishes from his first eight Iowa starts. He has two podium finishes in his last 22 starts and he has not had a podium finish on an oval since he was third at Iowa in 2017.
Colton Herta rounds out the top five on the gird for race one and this comes after his first retirement of 2020 after running over Rinus VeeKay. Herta has started in the top five in 12 of his 24 IndyCar starts. In his first 11 top five starts, he has finished in the top five only five times. Herta has yet to finish in the top five on an oval and he has finished outside the top fifteen in five of seven oval starts.
Jack Harvey will start in the top ten for his fifth consecutive races after setting his best oval start in both Iowa races. Harvey's best oval starting position before ending up sixth for the second Iowa race was 21st at the Texas season opener. He is coming off his first top ten finish of 2020 and his first top ten finish an oval after finishing seventh last night.
Álex Palou made an 11-position jump from 18th on the grid in race one to seventh for race two. The only time seventh starting position produced a winner at Iowa was in 2012 with Ryan Hunter-Reay. Palou's 11-position jump comes after finishing 11th in race one. Joining Palou on row four is another driver that made an 11-position leap from his race one starting position and that is Tony Kanaan. Kanaan matched his career worst starting position at Iowa in race one, ending up 19th. This will be the fourth time he has started on row four at Iowa. In the three previous times, he started seventh and finished worse than his starting position each time.
Marcus Ericsson was the top Ganassi qualifier for the first time in his brief career with the team after ending up ninth for race two, exactly where he finished in race one. It was Ericsson's fourth consecutive top ten finish and only his second top ten finish on an oval. Felix Rosenqvist makes it an all-Swedish row five. Rosenqvist has started in the top ten in every race this season but his Road America victory is his only top ten finish.
Charlie Kimball starts 11th for race two. Despite being Kimball's best starting position of 2020, it is the first time Kimball has not been the top Foyt qualifier this season. Patricio O'Ward ended up 12th, a position ahead of Arrow McLaren SP teammate Oliver Askew. O'Ward's second consecutive top five finish has him up to third in the championship, 70 points behind Scott Dixon. Askew's third place finish last night was the first consecutive race a driver has picked up a maiden podium finish after Palou was third in the first Road America race and O'Ward was second Road America race. Last night was Arrow McLaren SP's first double top five finish since Toronto 2018.
Ed Carpenter will start 14th. Carpenter has started outside the top ten in his last seven starts and in 11 of his last 14 starts. He has not had consecutive top ten starts since 2016. Rinus VeeKay ended up 15th on the grid for the second time in the last three races. Before last night's race Ed Carpenter Racing had at least one top ten finisher in every Iowa race it entered, and it had a top five finisher in seven consecutive Iowa races. Santino Ferrucci rounds out row eight. Ferrucci has started outside the top ten in seven of eight oval starts in his career. Ferrucci is ninth in the championship, 109 points behind Dixon, one behind Rosenqvist and three ahead of Power.
Marco Andretti starts 17th in race two. This is Andretti's best starting position at Iowa in his last six races. He did win from 17th on the grid at Iowa in 2011. It is the worst starting position for an Iowa winner. Last night, Andretti ended up 22nd after a clutch failure early in the race. It was the third time he has finished 22nd this season.
Scott Dixon had started in the top ten for 11 consecutive races prior to this weekend. That was snapped yesterday when Dixon ended up 17th on the grid and for race two he will start 18th. Dixon has won four races from outside the top ten, the most recent was from 22nd at Mid-Ohio in 2014. Last night was the 11th time he has finished on the podium after starting outside the top ten. Seven of 11 of those finishes were from outside the top fifteen on the grid. He has four podium finishes from his first five races, his best start since 2008, when he opened with six podium finishes from his first seven races.
Graham Rahal and Takuma Sato swept row ten for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing. Rahal has qualified ahead of Sato in five of six races. Rahal started the first four races in the top ten, but he qualified 21st and 19th at Iowa. Rahal was 12th in race one. He has never finished outside the top ten in consecutive Iowa races. Sato picked up his best starting position of 2020 in race one, starting sixth and he picked up his fourth consecutive top ten finish. The only time Sato has had four consecutive top ten finish was 2017 when he won Indianapolis, was eighth and fourth at Belle Isle and tenth at Texas.
Alexander Rossi and Zach Veach swept row 11 for Andretti Autosport. Rossi's second lap in qualifying saw him have a moment in the final corner and caused him to lift, dropping him to 21st on the grid for race two. It is Rossi's worst Iowa starting position and it is only the second time he has started outside the top twenty in his IndyCar career. The other time was the 2018 Indianapolis 500, where he started 32nd. Rossi is still looking for his first top five finish at Iowa after dropping to sixth in the close laps. Veach starts 22nd for the second consecutive race. This is Veach's worst starting position at Iowa. He has started outside the top fifteen in ten of the last 12 races.
Fuel pressure issues kept Simon Pagenaud from making a qualifying attempt yesterday and he will start dead last on the grid for the second time in as many days. Pagenaud went from last to first last night and it was the first time he has won a race from a starting position outside the top ten. His victory was the 19th time in IndyCar history a winner has started outside the top ten. The only driver with multiple victories from outside the top ten is Scott Dixon. After starting 22nd for race two at Road America, Pagenaud has started outside the top twenty for three consecutive races, the worst stretch of his career. The only time he had started outside the top twenty in consecutive prior to this weekend was in 2013 when he started 23rd at São Paulo and 21st at Indianapolis.
NBCSN's coverage of the second Iowa 250 begins at 8:30 p.m. ET with green flag scheduled for 8:45 p.m. ET. The race will be 250 laps.
