IndyCar Road America: O’Ward takes pole for Race 2

The Arrow McLaren SP-Chevrolet driver’s margin over the Andretti Harding Steinbrenner-Honda driver was just 0.0279sec but that was enough to push last year’s polesitter Herta to the outside of the front row.

In fact, Dale Coyne Racing with Team Goh’s Alex Palou, third place finisher in yesterday’s round, was closer to O’Ward – 0.0221sec – but being in the same group, he will start from the odd-numbered positions, and therefore third on the grid, alongside Ryan Hunter-Reay of Andretti Autosport.

The third row will consist of Graham Rahal’s Rahal Letterman Lanigan-Honda alongside the as-yet-unbeatable Scott Dixon of Chip Ganassi Racing who earned his third straight win yesterday.

The field ran in the same groups as yesterday, but this time with Group 2 going out first and tackling the track at its ‘greenest’.

In this group, Team Penske-Chevrolet drivers Will Power and Simon Pagenaud, as well as Arrow McLaren-SP Chevy’s Oliver Askew, all hurt their chances by speeding in pitlane, thereby incurring a drive-through penalty and consigning themselves to just one flying lap on the Firestone alternate tires. Power did well, therefore, to grab P4 in the session to edge his teammates, even if he did trail Herta, Hunter-Reay and Dixon, but he’s consigned to eighth, alongside Dixon’s Ganassi teammate Felix Rosenqvist.

Jack Harvey, who started his Meyer Shank Racing-Honda from the front row yesterday, will start from the fifth row on this occasion alongside semi-teammate Alexander Rossi.

With Penske finally dropping the ball in qualifying, yesterday’s polesitter Josef Newgarden will start only 14^th, while Pagenaud is 22^nd.

The race begins at 12.08pm ET.

GROUP 2

Cla	Driver	Team	Time	Gap	Mph
1	Patricio O'Ward	Arrow McLaren SP	1'44.897		137.758
2	Alex Palou	Dale Coyne Racing with Team Goh	1'44.919	0.022	137.729
3	Graham Rahal	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	1'45.032	0.135	137.580
4	Felix Rosenqvist	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'45.148	0.251	137.428
5	Jack Harvey	Meyer Shank Racing	1'45.509	0.612	136.958
6	Santino Ferrucci	Dale Coyne Racing with Vasser Sullivan	1'45.567	0.670	136.883
7	Charlie Kimball	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	1'45.834	0.937	136.538
8	Rinus van Kalmthout	Ed Carpenter Racing	1'46.033	1.135	136.282
9	Zach Veach	Andretti Autosport	1'46.181	1.284	136.091
10	Marco Andretti	Andretti Herta Autosport with Marco & Curb-Agajani	1'46.221	1.324	136.041
11	Max Chilton	Carlin	1'46.609	1.712	135.546
View full results

GROUP 1

Cla	Driver	Team	Time	Gap	Mph
1	Colton Herta	Andretti Harding Steinbrenner Autosport	1'44.925		137.721
2	Ryan Hunter-Reay	Andretti Autosport	1'45.153	0.228	137.422
3	Will Power	Team Penske	1'45.299	0.374	137.231
4	Alexander Rossi	Andretti Autosport	1'45.372	0.447	137.137
5	Takuma Sato	Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing	1'45.432	0.507	137.059
6	Josef Newgarden	Team Penske	1'45.460	0.535	137.022
7	Scott Dixon	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'45.490	0.565	136.983
8	Marcus Ericsson	Chip Ganassi Racing	1'45.785	0.860	136.601
9	Oliver Askew	Arrow McLaren SP	1'46.073	1.148	136.230
10	Conor Daly	Ed Carpenter Racing	1'46.485	1.560	135.704
11	Simon Pagenaud	Team Penske	1'46.573	1.648	135.591
12	Dalton Kellett	A.J. Foyt Enterprises	1'47.879	2.954	133.950
View full results