1. For the last three years, Álex Palou has put himself at the top of IndyCar's pecking order, and in his fourth Indianapolis 500 appearance, Palou took pole position with a four-lap average of 234.217 mph, the fastest pole position run in the event's 107-year history.
Palou is already a champion. He won the most recent race. Pole position is just another feather in his cap, and his car looks locked in like few others to take the track this week at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. In the previous two races, Palou has been at the front. Second in 2021 in his sophomore run, and he led many laps early before needing an emergency pit stop for fuel knock him out of the front positions last year. He still clawed his way back to a top ten finish, but victory was gone before he had even reached halfway.
Chip Ganassi Racing has had the best car at Indianapolis in possibly the last three Indianapolis 500s. The team isn't going to dip from its qualifying form in a week. This group is going to be strong, but there will be plenty of people aiming to knock Palou off.
This is a strange circumstance for Palou. Since last July, we know the displeasure Palou had being retained for the 2023 season with Ganassi, and Palou has his eyes set on McLaren. Palou leads the championship. He is on pole position for the Indianapolis 500. And yet, in four months, we all expect Palou announcing he will be leaving to join a rival.
Ganassi and Palou could litter the record book for the next ten to 15 years, and yet, this could be the beginning of the end of a very successful partnership.
2. The difference between pole position for Palou and send starting position for Rinus VeeKay was 0.040 seconds. That is it. It was 0.040 seconds over ten miles. I am not sure where you can try and looking for such an improvement. That is the difference of a bead of sweat, a tenth of degree Fahrenheit in the track, the 1/64 of an inch of a decal adding drag. VeeKay just fell short, but again he was impressive in qualifications.
Four Indianapolis 500 appearances and VeeKay has never started worse than fourth. This will be his third front row start. The race form hasn't been there, at least not over a full 500 miles, but VeeKay is going to be in the mix and this could be his year.
3. Unheralded, Felix Rosenqvist has been the best McLaren driver all weekend, and he was 0.0676 seconds short of pole position. Rosenqvist had one of the best balanced car throughout qualifying. This is probably the best Rosenqvist has driven in IndyCar, and he was unsung last year in the "500." He was in Patricio O'Ward's tire tracks for nearly the entire race and was in the picture for victory. He starts at the front this year and I imagine he will be up there for a good portion of the race.
4. Nobody had Santino Ferrucci qualifying fourth at 233.661 mph. Nobody! Ferrucci has been tremendous at Indianapolis over his first four starts. He hasn't put a wheel wrong in a race, and he only has one incident of note in practice. A.J. Foyt Racing hasn't been close really since Kenny Bräck won in 1999. This year, there wasn't any reason to think Ferrucci could make the top 12, let alone end up fourth. Middle of the field would have been respectable. This went above and beyond expectations.
Ferrucci is already good in the race, and he has done it with cars that have never qualified in the top ten. This car will be starting at the front. Most or the work is already done. It is a different race at the front, not just for the driver but the crew. Everyone around Ferrucci and Foyt have been here before. How does this pairing handle it?
5. It is difficult to be disappointed in qualifying fifth for the Indianapolis 500, but Patricio O'Ward likely expected better. O'Ward was still great, and he did nothing wrong. Marcus Ericsson won this race last year from fifth. It can be done. I think O'Ward will be focused on race day. Like Palou, O'Ward feels he was the man to beat the last two years. He is knows what he needs to do and what changes he needs to make to win this race. This might not have been the qualifying run he wanted, but 99.9% of qualifying runs are forgotten. Nobody forgets the Indianapolis 500 winner.
6. The pole position streak ends at two for Scott Dixon, but you know what? Pole position didn't work out the last two years. Sixth is a great place to start. Dixon can sit in line and save fuel. He can pace himself and use it to his advantage. The last thing the field needs to do is given Scott Dixon any advantage. Dixon will focus on hitting his marks over the first 120 laps, 300 miles. If he is in the top five at that point, the race just might be in his hands. You can never count out Scott Dixon. This year, that feels especially true.
7. Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing was likely going to see one of its cars miss the race when it took three of the four spots in the last chance qualifying session. RLLR would have had to be perfect, three-for-three, to avoid having a car miss the race. Sure enough, in the final minutes, it was Graham Rahal in 33rd at 229.159 mph, on the bubble and Jack Harvey on the outside.
With five minutes to go, it looked like Harvey was out after his second qualifying run fell short. Three minutes later, Harvey was back on the track, rolling the dice because sitting still wasn't going to get him in the race. He mind as well going down swinging to the very last seconds.
What transpired were the greatest ten miles of Harvey's career.
Lap one: 229.435 mph
Lap two: 229.092 mph
Lap three: 229.176 mph
Lap four: 228.971 mph
Average: 229.166 mph
Logic, history, science was telling us Harvey's Hail Mary would come up short. He had just ran a 228.929 mph average moments before. He needed to find nearly a quarter of a mile per hour over ten miles to make the race. The tires were worn, the engine was scorching, and Harvey's choice was only to power through it.
The pick up from lap two to three gave him life. How many qualifying runs did we see people gain from lap two to three this weekend? It couldn't be many. It might be one of just a handful of runs to see such a gain, and yet when Harvey needed it most it happened.
For the last two seasons, Harvey has been scorn after lackluster results. A few years ago, he was impressive at Meyer Shank Racing, taking a single-car team and putting it on the podium against the big boys. A driver doesn't accidentally do that, but Harvey could not recreate that success at RLLR, and frequently he was the worst of the three finishers. Results were so bad that Harvey was moved from the Hy-Vee sponsored #45 Honda to the #30 Honda entry, which has a greater rotation of sponsors.
Missing this race would have been devastating for Harvey's career. The entire start of this season has not been good for the Englishman. It would have been very easy for the team to make a switch ahead of Detroit if Harvey did not make the Indianapolis 500. With possibly his career on the line, at least in the short term, Harvey climbed out of the grave and will take 33rd on the starting grid next Sunday.
8. Falling six feet into the ground will be the 6' 2" Graham Rahal.
Many questions were already being asked ahead of qualifying. About Graham Rahal's future with his father's team, about this team's ability. At the end of yesterday, it felt like we were already getting some answers. Today... well, it is easy to read that change is upon the RLLR team. Any time a team misses the Indianapolis 500, change comes.
Schmidt Peterson Motorsports canned Leena Gabe after James Hinchcliffe missed in 2018. McLaren booted Bob Fernley after Fernando Alonso missed in 2019, and Alonso missing completely reshuffled McLaren's IndyCar entry. Max Chilton stepped away from ovals at Carlin after missing in 2019. RLLR is no different.
The heads will roll tomorrow. The tears flowed today.
Long term, father and son will have plenty of difficult discussions. I bet Graham doesn't want to leave, but at 34 years old he doesn't want to spend the rest of his 30s struggling just to be competitive. He can win races. It has been awhile but he still believes in himself. He had one great championship effort, and he probably believes he can fight for it again. But can that happen at RLLR?
The organization has been at the doorstep for quite sometime. As it has grown, it has not gotten closer to the mountaintop. For Rahal the driver, it could be time to try elsewhere. He has one last chance to roll the dice. After today, it might be easier to let go.
9. We cannot move on without mentioning Christian Lundgaard and Sting Ray Robb, the two other drivers that will occupy row 11. Lundgaard was probably closer to Robb than expected, but Lundgaard has been the best RLLR car all week, best RLLR car all month going back to the Grand Prix of Indianapolis. Lundgaard handled the pressure wonderfully.
Robb probably didn't expect to be this close to missing it. The entire Coyne likely didn't expect this. He is a rookie. Coyne has gone through a number of changes. They battle through it and get to race in the Indianapolis 500. Take the win.
10. We return to the Fast 12 portion of the program. Alexander Rossi was one massive lift into turn three on his final lap from advancing to the Fast 6. That was the difference between putting himself and putting Patricio O'Ward on the bubble. Rossi scrubbed off a lot of speed on his qualifying run today. These were much different conditions than when he qualified on Saturday.
The car looks competitive. He might be the third best McLaren starter, but I expect Rossi to be at the front and mixing it at the front all race long. He will be going toe-to-toe with at least one if not two or all three of his teammates.
11. Takuma Sato was on the ragged edge over the last few days, and Sato could put down explosive single laps, but struggled to carry the pace over four laps. On Sunday, all it could get him was eighth. Not bad, but man it felt like Sato was going to be the man to beat for pole position. Tony Kanaan was the slowest of the four McLaren drivers all week, but he still had pace in the car. I think ninth was the best Kanaan was going to be hoping for today.
12. Marcus Ericsson will defend his Indianapolis 500 victory from tenth. As we have seen in most Honda teams, good opening laps, but the pace could not carry over an entire run for Ericsson. Nobody thought Benjamin Pedersen would be in the Fast 12, so 11th is more than a wonderful result from. Qualifying is one thing and Pedersen had terrific pace on his own, but in a week's time he will be in the thick of the pack, a place he has never been before. That is my concern heading into next week.
13. Will Power was 12th on Saturday and 12th on Sunday. It was surprising none of the Team Penske cars were competing for pole position. It felt during practice this group was going to be contending at the top and it didn't quite pan out. This feels a lot like the last two years where Penske didn't look daunting in practice and in those races Penske wasn't really a factor. It seems odd thinking that will be the case for a third consecutive year, but a week away from the "500" and I don't know if anyone is considering Penske an obstacle to victory.
14. This final day qualifying format is agonizing. I liked that the Fast 12 and Fast 6 were split with the last chance qualifying in the middle, but to go from bumping and Graham Rahal missing to the first Fast 6 car taking to the track moments later, you really do not get a chance to process what the hell just happened.
It was worse in 2019. I don't think people realized Sébastien Bourdais was on track for the Fast Nine session because everyone was still trying to speak to Kyle Kaiser and find Fernando Alonso.
There was a lot of dead time between the Fast 12 ending and the last chance qualifying beginning. I almost think an adjustment could be to have last chance qualifying start 15 minutes after the Fast 12 round ends and have that run for an hour and then 30 minutes later start the Fast 6.
In theory, start the Fast 12 at 2:00 p.m., have the last chance qualifying begin at 3:30 p.m. and then at 5:00 p.m. begin the Fast 6.
Also, can we just allow more fans and cooling devices for these teams? If all these teams have them then no one has an advantage. The last chance qualifying session was about 35 minutes of guys sitting around because nobody is allow to properly cool the cars or do extensive work on the cars, and the only team that is going to do extensive work is the team out of the field because that team has no time to lose, only time to gain.
The way the last chance qualifying session is set up now is for everyone to have their one run and then have the one team on the outside work and see if it can get in with the cars in the field handcuffed to counter any better run.
I don't know if we go back to the last chance qualifying just being one attempt and get rid of the clock. If we had done that, Jack Harvey isn't in this race, but if the last chance qualifying session had been an hour in 2019, it is likely Fernando Alonso is in the race, Kyle Kaiser is not and who knows if Juncos Hollinger Racing exists today if that is the case.
Let's wait and see how they tweak qualifying next year.
15. The field is set. We can have a breather. Practice tomorrow and then some rest, but the next week is still going to be hectic.
