Romain Grosjean begins the 2023 NTT IndyCar Series season from pole position for the Firestone Grand prix of St. Petersburg. Grosjean took pole position with a lap of 59.5532 seconds, 0.4155 seconds faster than Colton Herta, who rounds out an all-Andretti Autosport front row. This is Grosjean's second career pole position. In the previous two seasons, the opening race has seen a first time winner. This will be the Frenchman's 31st career start. Only two drivers had their first career victory come in the 31st start of a career. They are Tony Kanaan and Airton Daré. Grosjean did not have a top five finish in the final nine races of 2022. Prior to the 2022 season, he had never gone more than three races without a top five finish. He was fifth last year at St. Petersburg.
Colton Herta will start second. It is the first time Andretti Autosport has swept the front row since Laguna Seca 2021. Herta won that race. This is the four consecutive St. Petersburg race Herta has started in the top three. He has three top ten finishes in four St. Petersburg starts with his worst finish being 11th. Herta has finished outside the top five in the last three races. He has not gone four consecutive races without a top five finish since his rookie season when he went 13 races without a top five result.
Patricio O'Ward qualified third, 0.4631 seconds off pole position. This is the eighth consecutive race O'Ward has started in the top ten. Six of those are top five starting positions. He has four top five results and five top ten results in his last seven races. O'Ward was the top Arrow McLaren finisher in 11 of 17 races last season. St. Petersburg has never been won from the third starting position.
Marcus Ericsson starts fourth, his best St. Petersburg starting position. Ericsson was 0.8903 seconds off Grosjean. This is the fifth time in the last 18 races Ericsson has started in the top five. He had two top five starts in the first 46 starts of his career. Ericsson has not finished in the top five in his last seven starts. Ericsson had five top five finishes in the ten races prior to this slump.
Kyle Kirkwood will start fifth after what was his first Firestone Fast Six appearance of his career. However, an accident in the first corner of his fast lap erased any chance at pole position. Kirkwood has not finished in the top ten in his last 14 starts. His only career top ten finish was tenth at Long Beach last April.
Scott McLaughlin also caused a red flag in the final round of qualifying, negating his fastest laps, and leaving him sixth on the grid. McLaughlin has finished in the top ten in his last six starts and in nine of his previous ten starts. During that stretch McLaughlin has two victories, five podium finishes and six top five results. In his previous 24 starts, he had one victory, three podium finishes and four top five results.
Álex Palou missed out on the Fast Six by 0.0095 seconds and he will start seventh. Palou is coming off winning the Laguna Seca season finale in 2022. He won that race from 11th starting position. Palou has never won consecutive races in his IndyCar career. He has finished on the podium after two of his first three victories in his IndyCar career.
Felix Rosenqvist qualified eighth, and this will be the second consecutive race he has started eighth. Rosenqvist started eighth in three races last season, and he finished in the top five in each of those three events. He ended last season with ten top ten finishes in the final 13 races. Rosenqvist had seven top ten finishes in his previous 32 starts. His average finish in season openers is 15.5 and his average finish at St. Petersburg is 12.75.
Scott Dixon is ninth in car #9, as Dixon was 0.0324 seconds off the Fast Six. Dixon has six consecutive top ten finishes at St. Petersburg, but Dixon is still looking for his first victory at the track. Dixon has never won the season opener when it has been at a road or street circuit. All three of his season opening victories were on ovals. In all three of those seasons Dixon went on to win the championship.
Will Power will start tenth. This is only the third time Power has qualified outside the top five in 16 St. Petersburg appearances. It is only the fourth time Power has qualified off the front row at St. Petersburg. He has finished on the podium in seven of 17 season openers. However, he has never finished fourth or fifth in a season opener in his career.
Christian Lundgaard ended up 11th in qualifying, the only non-Penske, Ganassi or Andretti entry to make it to the second round. Lundgaard made it out of the first round of qualifying five times last season. The Dane was the 2022 IndyCar Rookie of the Year. The last three Rookies of the Year won a race in their sophomore season.
Alexander Rossi makes his Arrow McLaren debut from 12th starting position. Rossi has finished outside the top ten in five of seven St. Petersburg starts, and Rossi has an average finish of 13.285 in this event. He has finished 20th or worse the last three seasons at St. Petersburg. The only time Rossi has won from a starting position worse than third was 11th in the 100th Indianapolis 500, his first career victory.
Marcus Armstrong makes his IndyCar debut from 13th position. Armstrong fell 0.1140 seconds short of advancing to round two on debut. Armstrong will become the eighth New Zealander to start an IndyCar race. This will be the first IndyCar race with three New Zealand drivers competing. The last time an IndyCar race was won from 13th position was Texas 2016, which Graham Rahal won.
Josef Newgarden starts 14th after coming 0.0394 seconds shy of advancing from round one. Newgarden had made it out of round one in the previous four St. Petersburg races. He has failed to finish in the top fifteen in the last two season openers and in four of 11 season openers in his career. Newgarden's average finish in the season opener is 12.272.
Hélio Castroneves will roll off from 15th position. Castroneves started in the top ten in each of his first 11 St. Petersburg starts, but this will be the third consecutive time he starts outside the top ten in this race. Castroneves has not finished in the top five on a street course since he was second in the 2016 Toronto race.
David Malukas wound up 16th on the grid. Malukas had started in top ten in three consecutive street course races and he had made it out of the first round of qualifying in six consecutive road/street course events. His average finish on street courses last year was 18th. His average starting position on street courses last year was 12.2.
Santino Ferrucci will start 17th, his best starting position for a St. Petersburg race. Ferrucci has six top ten finishes in his last eight starts. Ferrucci has finished ninth and 23rd in his two St. Petersburg starts. A.J. Foyt Racing has had at least one top ten finisher in six of the last ten St. Petersburg races.
Devlin DeFrancesco starts 18th for the second consecutive year at St. Petersburg. Last year, DeFrancesco ended up 22nd in the final result and completed all 100 laps. DeFrancesco ended 2022 with three top fifteen finishes in the final six races after he had zero top fifteen finishes in the first 11 races of the season.
Jack Harvey leads an all-Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing row ten. Harvey has finished in the top ten at St. Petersburg in each of the last two odd-numbered years. Harvey had only one top ten finish in 2023 and he has not finished in the top five in his last 18 starts.
Graham Rahal rounds out the top twenty. This is the 18th time in the last 20 races Rahal has started outside the top ten. His only top five finish in a season opener was his runner-up result at St. Petersburg in 2018. Rahal has only five top ten finishes in 15 St. Petersburg starts, three of which were his first three starts in this race from 2008 to 2010.
Agustín Canapino starts his IndyCar career from the 21st position, and ahead of his teammate as Canapino leads an all-Juncos Hollinger Racing row 11. Canapino will become the ninth Argentine driver to start an IndyCar race. The best finish for an Argentine driver was sixth at the hands of Gastón Mazzacane in the 2004 Toronto race.
Callum Ilott will start from 22nd position for the fourth time in his career, but this will be his first time starting 22nd on a road or street course. Ilott started 22nd in both Iowa races last year and at Gateway as well. The worst starting position for a St. Petersburg winner is 21st. Ilott's best finish on a street course last season was 14th at Toronto. Ilott's average street course finish was 18th.
Sting Ray Robb starts 23rd for his IndyCar debut. Robb has made 11 starts at St. Petersburg in Road to Indy competition. Robb won at the track in Indy Pro 2000 in 2020. Along with that victory he had seven top five finishes in those 11 starts.
Rinus VeeKay starts 24th, his worst starting position since he started 24th in the final two races of the 2021 season. VeeKay had started in the top ten in all three of his previous St. Petersburg appearances. He has finished sixth in the season opener the last two years. No IndyCar race has ever been won from the 24th starting position.
Simon Pagenaud brought out a red flag in qualifying, which relegated Pagenaud to 25th on the grid. This will be Pagenaud's 200th start. No driver has won in their 200th IndyCar start. All century mark race winners have come in a driver's 100th start, which include A.J. Foyt, Roger McCluskey, Mario Andretti, Mike Mosley and Patrick Carpentier. The best finish for a driver in his 200th start is second. It has happened three times, first with Gordon Johncock at Atlanta in 1979, then with Al Unser, Jr. at Michigan in 1995 and Paul Tracy was second at Portland in 2003.
Conor Daly will start 26th position, his worst starting position on a road/street course in his career. Daly has started 26th or worse three times in the Indianapolis 500. His best starting position at St. Petersburg is 14th and this will be the fifth time he has started outside the top fifteen in this race. Daly has finished outside the top twenty in three consecutive starts. Daly has never had four consecutive results outside the top twenty in his IndyCar career.
Benjamin Pedersen begins his IndyCar career from 27th on the grid, the only car on row 14. Only once has an IndyCar race been won from the 27th starting position. That was Fred Frame in the 1932 Indianapolis 500. Pedersen was second in last year's Indy Lights race at St. Petersburg.
NBC's coverage of the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg begins at noon ET with green flag scheduled for 12:30 p.m. ET. The race is scheduled for 100 laps.
