Scott McLaughlin took his third pole position of the IndyCar season at Portland International Raceway with a lap of 58.2349 seconds in Saturday qualifying. Each time McLaughlin has started on the front row this season he has finished first or second. McLaughlin enters Portland with four consecutive top five finishes, and he has led a lap in three consecutive races. Only three drivers have at least four consecutive top five finishes this season. Will Power was in the top five of the first five races of the season and Scott Dixon was in the top five at Mid-Ohio, Toronto and the Iowa doubleheader. McLaughlin enters 54 points behind championship leader Will Power. McLaughlin must leave Portland within 49 points of the championship to have a chance at the championship at Laguna Seca.
Will Power makes it an all-Team Penske front row after being 0.1905 seconds off McLaughlin's top time. This is the sixth time Power has started on the front row this season. It is the fourth time Team Penske has swept the front row and the third time in the last six races. Four of Will Power's 41 career victories have come in the 16th race or later in a season. He has won the 16th race twice in his career, at Milwaukee in 2014, his championship season, and at Portland in 2019. He has finished outside the top ten in three of five Portland starts.
Christian Lundgaard starts third for the second time in three races. This is also the third time in the last four races Lundgaard has started in the top ten. He had only two top ten starts in the first 12 races this season. He has finished in the top ten in the last three road/street course races. This is Lundgaard's 17th career start. The last driver to have a first career victory in a 17th career start was Will Power at the 2007 Las Vegas season opener for Champ Car.
Álex Palou joins Lundgaard on row two. Palou could become the first driver to win consecutive Portland races since Gil de Ferran in 1999 and 2000. Palou would become the fifth driver with consecutive Portland victories (Mario Andretti 1985-86, Michael Andretti 1990-92, Al Unser, Jr. 1994-95, de Ferran 1999-00). Only three of 79 races since the introduction of the universal aero kit in 2018 have been won from fourth starting position.
Patricio O'Ward leads an all-Arrow McLaren SP front row. This is the 12th time O'Ward has been the top AMSP qualifier this season. O'Ward swept the 2018 Indy Lights doubleheader at Portland on his way to the Indy Lights championship. No driver has ever won at Portland in IndyCar and Indy Lights. O'Ward is one of four past Indy Lights winners entered in the IndyCar race this weekend.
Felix Rosenqvist starts sixth. This is the 11th race Rosenqvist has started in the top ten this season. In seven of those occasions, Rosenqvist qualified behind O'Ward. The Swede was second and sixth in his first two Portland starts. The only tracks where Rosenqvist has at least three top ten finishes are the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course and Road America.
Colton Herta is the top Andretti Autosport starter in seventh position. This is the sixth consecutive race Herta has started outside the top five, his longest streak without a top five starting position. Herta has been the top Andretti Autosport finisher in six races, leading all the drivers in that team. However, three of those occasions have been races where Andretti Autosport has not had any top ten finishers.
Josef Newgarden takes eighth position on the grid after serving a six-spot grid penalty for an unapproved engine change after the Gateway race. Newgarden was the second fastest qualifier, the middle of a Penske sweep of the top three times. He was 0.0780 seconds off McLaughlin's pole time. Newgarden has only won from eighth starting position once, the 2020 season finale at St. Petersburg. Only five of 27 Portland races have been won from a starting position outside the top five. The last time Newgarden started eighth he didn’t complete a lap as he spun four turns into the 2021 season opener at Barber Motorsports Park.
Alexander Rossi qualified ninth. Through 15 races, Alexander Rossi has finished in 15 different positions, tied for the most different finishing positions from the start of a season with Ed Jones, who opened the 2017 season with 15 different finishing positions. He did finish ninth at Barber Motorsports Park. The best position Rossi has not achieved this season is sixth.
David Malukas gets his sixth top ten starting position of the season. Malukas has be the top Dale Coyne Racing finisher in seven consecutive races. Malukas could become the first driver to score a first career victory after a runner-up finish in the previous race since Robert Doornbos at Mont-Tremblant in the 2007 Champ Car season.
Graham Rahal will start 11th. Rahal led 36 laps in last year's Portland race. It was the most laps Rahal has led in a race since his most recent victory in the second Belle Isle race in 2017. Those 36 laps led is the third most laps led in a single race for Rahal behind the two Belle Isle races in 2017, which he swept.
Rinus VeeKay takes the outside of row six. This the 12th time VeeKay has been the top Ed Carpenter Racing qualifier this season. He has been the top ECR finisher in seven of 15 races this season, but VeeKay has finished off the lead lap in three of the last four races. All three ECR finishers were outside the top twenty at Gateway. The team hasn't had a double top ten since last year's Indianapolis 500.
Kyle Kirkwood missed out on advancing to the second round of qualifying by 0.0702 seconds. This is Kirkwood's best starting position since he was ninth at Mid-Ohio. He has won at Portland in all three Road to Indy series. Kirkwood swept the 2018 U.S. F2000 doubleheader and the 2019 Indy Pro 2000 doubleheader. He split the Indy Lights races last year, winning race two and finishing second in the first race.
Callum Ilott was 0.0491 seconds shy of advancing from group two of qualifying. Ilott has finished better than his starting position in five consecutive races, but none of those have been top ten finishes. He did start 19th or 22nd in each of the last five races. This is only the sixth time he has stated in the top fifteen this season.
Romain Grosjean rolls off from 15th position. Grosjean has finished outside the top ten in three consecutive races, the second time he has three consecutive finishes outside the top ten. The other time was the two Indianapolis races in May and Belle Isle. Grosjean has yet to have four consecutive results outside the top ten in his IndyCar career.
Scott Dixon will start 16th, his fifth time starting outside the top ten in the last six races. This is Dixon's worst starting position at Portland. His previous worst was 11th. Dixon has three consecutive top five finishes at Portland, including podium finishes in the last two races. Dating back to Dixon's two CART starts at Portland over 20 years ago, he has never finished worse than seventh at this track.
Jack Harvey starts 17th, his worst starting spot since he started 24th at Mid-Ohio. Harvey was fourth in last year's Portland race, but he was 16th and 19th in his first two Portland starts. Harvey was punted in turn one of the 2019 race while running the top five when Ryan Hunter-Reay collided with the back of the Brit's car.
Marcus Ericsson qualified 18th, his third time occupying the outside of row nine in 2022. Ericsson only made his Portland debut last year and he finished seventh. Ericsson missed the 2019 race due to Formula One responsibilities with the Alfa Romeo Racing as Kimi Räikkönen was uncertain for the Belgian Grand Prix with neck stiffness. Räikkönen did end up competing that weekend.
Simon Pagenaud finds himself 19th in the starting order. Five of Pagenaud's seven top ten finishes this season have come when he has started outside the top ten. He has finished in the top ten of the 16th race of the season on five consecutive occasions. The only time he was not in the top ten of the 16th race of the season was the 2015 Sonoma season finale when he finished 16th.
Conor Daly rounds out the top twenty on the grid. Daly has finished outside the top fifteen in six consecutive races and he has finished worse than his starting position in four of the last five races. He was 21st and 16th in his first two Portland starts. Four of Daly's 18 career top ten finishes have come from starting positions of 20th or worse. Three of those came in the 2016 season. The other was the 2017 Texas race.
Hélio Castroneves starts 21st, his worst start at Portland. Castroneves had started in the top three in three of his five Portland starts. He has finished outside the top ten in four of five Portland starts. His average finish at the track is 17.2. Entering this race, he has finished outside the top ten in six consecutive races and his average finish in that span is 16.8333.
Takuma Sato matches his worst starting position of the season in 22nd. This is Sato's third time starting 22nd. The Japanese driver is coming off finishing fifth at Gateway, snapping a 23-race top five finishes drought. Sato has not had consecutive top five finishes since he won the Indianapolis 500 and was second at Gateway in 2020. Sato has not had a top five finish on a natural-terrain road course since he won at Barber Motorsports Park in 2019.
Jimmie Johnson takes 23rd on the grid. Johnson has started outside the top twenty in every road/street course race this season. He has finished in the top fifteen in three of the last five races, all on ovals, and Johnson has four top twenty finishes in the last five races. He ended last season with three consecutive top twenty finishes, which began with a 20th at Portland.
Devlin DeFrancesco starts 24th, the seventh time DeFrancesco has started outside the top twenty this season. He was 11th and seventh in last year's Indy Lights races at Portland. DeFrancesco is coming off his best finish in IndyCar when he was 12th at Gateway. His best finish on a road/street course is 17th, which occurred at Barber Motorsports Park and Mid-Ohio.
Dalton Kellett rounds out the grid in 25th. Kellett was the slowest qualifier, but he also had a six-spot grid penalty for an unapproved engine change. He had a mechanical failure end his Portland race last year and it classified him in 26th. Kellett did finish fifth at Portland in the first Indy Lights race in 2019, one of 12 top five finishes he had in 70 Indy Lights starts.
NBC's coverage of the Grand Prix of Portland begins at 3:00 p.m. ET with green flag scheduled for 3:30 p.m. ET. The race is scheduled for 110 laps.
