Felix Rosenqvist took pole position for the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach with a lap at 67.4635 seconds in the final round of qualifying on Saturday afternoon. It is Rosenqvist’s seven career pole position, and his first since he won pole at Long Beach in 2024. Rosenqvist has three consecutive top ten finishes at Long Beach, and his fourth-place finish last year was his best result in this race. The Swede enters this weekend 96 starts removed from his only career victory at Road America in 2020. Meyer Shank Racing won the IMSA race on Saturday from pole position with Renger van der Zande and Nicky Yelloly in the #93 Acura. Hélio Castroneves’ 2021 Indianapolis 500 victory remains MSR’s only IndyCar victory.
Patricio O'Ward was 0.0441 seconds off Rosenqvist’s pole-winning time and O’Ward will start second. It is his best starting position of the season, and it is his best Long Beach start. Long Beach is historically one of O'Ward's worst races. He was fifth in 2022, but he has an average finish of 15th in six starts with three finishes outside the top fifteen. In his last 14 starts, O’Ward has ten top five finishes and four finishes of 17th or worse.
Álex Palou takes third after running 0.0654 seconds off the top time. Palou could become the sixth different driver to win the Grand Prix of Long Beach for Chip Ganassi Racing. Alex Zanardi and Scott Dixon have each won the race twice for Ganassi. Jimmy Vasser, Juan Pablo Montoya and Dario Franchitti each won it once. No Long Beach winner has started third since Simon Pagenaud in 2016.
Kyle Kirkwood starts to Palou’s outside. Kirkwood is looking for his fifth consecutive top five finish. The most recent Andretti Global driver to have five consecutive top five finishes was Alexander Rossi, who had six consecutive top five finishes from the Indianapolis 500 through Toronto in 2019. No Long Beach winner has started third since James Hinchcliffe in 2017.
David Malukas rounds out the top five, a personal best for Malukas at Long Beach. This is the fourth consecutive race Malukas is the top Team Penske starter. Last year, Malukas picked up personal bests in starting position and finishing position at Long Beach. While he started tenth, he ended up finishing 17th. It was his first lead lap finish at Long Beach.
Scott Dixon starts in the top ten for the first time this season in sixth. Dixon has finished in the top ten of the last three races, but none of those results were in the top five. He has not had four consecutive top ten finishes that were also not top five finishes since 2020 when he was tenth in both races of the Mid-Ohio doubleheader and then ninth in both races of the Harvest Grand Prix doubleheader at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course.
Will Power was 0.0272 seconds from advancing to the final round, putting Power seventh on the grid instead. Though a two-time Long Beach winner, Power has not won this race since 2012. A victory this year would be the second-longest span between Long Beach victories at 14 years. Michael Andretti went 16 years between victories in 1986 and 2002. This will be a record-extending 20th Long Beach start for Power.
Scott McLaughlin starts eighth after having an accident in Saturday morning practice for the second consecutive race weekend. In his last ten street course starts, McLaughlin has two top five finishes, both at St. Petersburg. His most recent top five finish in a street race that wasn't St. Petersburg was second in the 2023 Nashville street race.
Kyffin Simpson takes ninth on the grid, Simpson’s second top ten start this season. He started tenth at St. Petersburg. Last year, he drove from 17th to tenth in this race. Simpson has finished 20th in the last two races. He has completed every lap this season.
Graham Rahal has his best Long Beach starting position since 2019 as he will start this race from tenth. Coming off a third at Barber Motorsports Park, Rahal has not had consecutive top five finishes since he was fifth in both races at the 2021 Belle Isle doubleheader. He has not had consecutive podium finishes since 2020 when he was third in the second Iowa race and third in the Indianapolis 500.
Christian Lundgaard takes 11th on the grid, the fourth time in five races Lundgaard is starting outside the top ten. His average starting position this season is 13.6. Last year was the first time Lundgaard has finished in the top ten at Long Beach. Lundgaard was third. He started 12th in that race.
Rinus VeeKay starts 12th this year at Long Beach, his best starting spot ever at Long Beach. VeeKay had never made it out of the first round of qualifying at Long Beach prior to yesterday. VeeKay has never finished in the top ten at Long Beach with an average finish of 19.4 over his five starts.
Marcus Armstrong was 0.0030 seconds off advancing out of the first round of qualifying, and this will place Armstrong 13th on the grid. He had started in the top ten in seven consecutive road/street course races. Armstrong has not finished in the top five of his last six street course starts.
Josef Newgarden missed out on the second round by 0.0169 seconds, placing him 14th. Newgarden could leave this weekend with four top ten finishes from the first five races. It would be the first time he has done that since 2021, and the fifth time he has done it in his career. In two of those seasons, he won the championship.
Marcus Ericsson has his worst starting position of the season in 15th. Ericsson has three top ten finishes through the first four races of 2026. He had two top ten finishes over the entire 2025 season. Four of his last top five finishes have come on street courses.
Christian Rasmussen starts outside the top ten for the ninth consecutive road/street course race. Rasmussen starts 16th. Ed Carpenter Racing has not had a top ten finish at Long Beach since Spencer Pigot was eighth in 2017. ECR has had one car finish outside the top twenty in three consecutive Long Beach races.
Louis Foster will start 17th. Foster has finished in the top fifteen in his last three street course starts. His 13th at Arlington was his best street course finish. He went from 20th to 16th in last year’s Long Beach race.
Alexander Rossi lines up directly behind his Ed Carpenter Racing teammate Rasmussen in 18th. Since winning consecutive Long Beach races in 2018 and 2019, Rossi has not finished better than sixth in this race. He has not finished worse than his starting position this season.
Dennis Hauger makes his Long Beach debut from 19th on the grid in car #19. He started 19th at Arlington two races ago and finished 16th. Hauger won both his street course starts last season in Indy Lights. He is coming off his worst finish in his brief IndyCar career. Hauger was 23rd at Barber, one lap down.
Caio Collet will be to Hauger’s outside. Through his first four starts, Collet has yet to finish worse than his starting position. He improved in each of his first three races. At Barber, he started and finished 21st. Collet has completed every lap in all three road/street course races this season.
Mick Schumacher makes it three consecutive rookies on the grid with Schumacher starting 21st. Including the Formula One-era of the Grand Prix of Long Beach, Schumacher will become the sixth German to compete in this race. Jochen Mass, Hans-Joachim Stuck, Rolf Stommelen and Manfred Winkelhock all ran at Long Beach in Formula One. Timo Glock is the only German to run Long Beach in the IndyCar-era. Glock was sixth in the 2005 race.
For the third consecutive year, Santino Ferrucci starts outside the top twenty at Long Beach. Ferrucci starts 22nd. His best Long Beach start was 13th in 2019. In four Long Beach starts, Ferrucci has finished 21st, 11th, 21st and 11th.
Romain Grosjean starts 23rd. Grosjean has twice finished second at Long Beach. He is one of four drivers with multiple runner-up finishes at Long Beach to have never won the race. Bobby Rahal was four times the runner-up in this race. Emerson Fittipaldi and Justin Wilson each finished second twice.
Sting Ray Robb rounds out row 12. The good news is Robb's streak of consecutive 21st-place finishes ended at three at Barber Motorsports Park. The bad news is he finished 22nd at Barber. This is Robb’s third consecutive race starting outside the top twenty, and he has failed to finish on the lead lap in six consecutive starts.
Nolan Siegel starts last, 25th for the first of two races in his native California. Siegel has finished outside the top ten in 11 consecutive starts. His best career finish on a street course was 19th at Detroit last year. He has finished 20th in each of his two Long Beach starts.
Fox's coverage of the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach begins at 5:30 p.m. ET with green flag scheduled for 5:45 p.m. ET. The race is scheduled for 90 laps.
