TORONTO — Christian Lundgaard of Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing won the pole for Sunday’s Honda Indy Toronto in a wild, chaotic and sometimes confusing qualification session on Saturday.
The Rahal Letterman Lanigan driver completed his lap on a drying track and was the last to cross the line.
His time of 1:04.14567 seconds around the 11-turn, 1.786-mile temporary street course for the Honda Indy Toronto was fast enough to give Lundgaard his second NTT P1 Award of the season.
“I have a history, at least in go-karts, of going fast in the rain, but the Hy-Vee car today was there,” Lundgaard said. “I know this is wet and this is tricky, but we have made huge progress. It’s a street circuit and it’s important to be in the front.”
Team Penske’s Scott McLaughlin was originally listed as the second fastest, but he spun out on his fastest lap and that blocked the track, impeding other drivers from getting a clean lap. Marcus Ericsson was also involved in Turn 10.
McLaughlin lost his original time but battled back to run a lap at 1:04.4790 seconds. That allowed the Team Penske driver to start second followed by Pato O’Ward’s 1:04.5500-second lap time, Marcus Ericsson’s 1:04.4091, Felix Rosenqvist’s 1:04.9423 and Will Power’s 1:05.0703.
Rain early in Saturday’s qualifications for the Honda Indy Toronto created an opportunity for the field to finally make up some ground on NTT IndyCar Series points leader Alex Palou.
The 2021 IndyCar Series champion entered the race weekend with a 110-point lead over Chip Ganassi Racing teammate Scott Dixon. But Palou was in the first group of the first segment that was on course when it rained. He was outside of the top six drivers at that point and with rain on the track, didn’t have a chance to run a faster lap and advance.
Palou, who was eighth at the time the track got wet and was one second down to advancing into the next segment.
“It wasn’t the weather, I could have done a better job,” Palou said. “It’s a shame that we are going to have to start in the back, but we have a fast car and can make it from there. When you start further than 10th, it’s going to be a busy race. It will be our first one of the year, and hopefully the last one.
“We’ll have to work for it, for sure.”
Palou will start inside row eight.
In the first group of the first segment, Kyle Kirkwood ran a fast lap early at 1:01.0963 seconds and that worked to his benefit because it began to rain with 1:30 left in the session.
When the checkered flag waved, the rain was intensifying with Kirkwood on top at 1:00.6453 seconds followed by Rinus VeeKay’s Chevrolet at 1:01.1978, Christian Lundgaard’s Honda at 1:01.2205, Will Power’s Chevrolet at 1:01.3766, Scott Dixon’s Honda at 1:01.4546 and Scott McLaughlin’s Chevrolet at 1:01.4641.
Missing out were Helio Castroneves (1:01.5325), Palou (1:01.634), Jack Harvey (1:02.0296), Ryan Hunter-Reay (1:02.2554), Sting Ray Robb (1:02.3978) and Benjamin Pedersen (1:02.6358).
The rain increased before the second group hit the track, allowing Group 2 to work on rain tires.
But IndyCar Race Control put a “track hold” during the rain to pause the session. After about a 10-minute pause, group two went out on rain tires.
Herta, who was the fastest driver of the weekend, had to carefully drive around the soaked race course while maintaining control of his No. 26 Honda. Augustin Canapino spun around on course, costing him his fastest lap.
Herta slid into the runoff, costing him his fasting lap for bringing out a local yellow flag. Romain Grosjean’s Honda also went into the runoff area, so did Tom Blomqvist of Meyer Shank Racing.
Graham Rahal was second quick when he brushed the wall in Turn 6 but was able to keep on track without a local yellow, so he was not penalized, but he did drop out of the top six. He came into the pits to replace the front wing.
“It was good at the start, being behind Colton early in the group was a benefit,” Rahal said. “We, as a team, have struggled mightily in the rain. It’s tough, but it’s the same for everybody. I didn’t put it together and spun in the wrong spot and it cost us dearly. It’s going to make tomorrow a long day.
“The street courses have been a major weakness. We have improved on the road courses, but still struggle on the streets.”
Blomqvist, surprisingly, advanced into the top six with five minutes remaining, but didn’t stay there for long.
Grosjean had the fastest time of the session, and spun after completing his lap, but was able to continue with four minutes left.
Alexander Rossi was off course in Turn 1, where he remained for the rest of the session. His car was brought back to the pits on the hook of a tow truck after his Chevrolet lost power from an apparent electrical issue.
“Electrically, the car just died,” Rossi said. “I’ve never seen that before. It sucks because the car was awesome. It should have been an easy P1 advance, no problem.”
In the final minute of the session and the track starting to dry, Blomqvist was able to race his way into the top six but was once again bumped out with 30 seconds remaining.
“It’s a shame I didn’t get a dry session because we were making a step in the right direction,” said Blomqvist, who is making his first IndyCar Series start this weekend. “It was another challenge in the wet. I enjoy the wet, but I have to find the grip again. I just need more laps, my story of the whole weekend.
“It’s my first weekend. Every little bit is getting better and better. I’ll get a good sleep in and see what the race brings.”
By the time the sloppy session was completed, Romain Grosjean was the fastest at 1:14.0454 and teammate Colton Herta was bumped out at 1:14.8356. Herta was attempting to win three poles in a row.
“We were a lot better in the dry than we were in the wet, unfortunately,” Herta said. “We struggled with wheel spin. If it’s a rain race tomorrow, at least we got some practice in the wet.”
Because of the chaos and the lap times completed by spinning and swerving cars, the session was under review.
After a lengthy review, it went back to green at 3:46 p.m. (ET).
There were no changes to the session so the drivers that advanced were Grosjean (1:14.0454), Marcus Ericsson (1:14.0931), Josef Newgarden (1:14.2781), Rosenqvist (1:14.4562), Pato O’Ward (1:14.6156) and Marcus Armstrong (1:14.8143).
The second segment was on a damp track, but it had stopped raining.
The track was drying very quickly, but more rain was on the way, so it was important to get fast laps early.
It began to dry even more, but there were areas of the course too wet for teams to swap to the dry tires.
O’Ward put new Firestone rain tires on with 1:30 left and it was enough for him to get the best time of the session at 1:11.3448. That knocked Christian Lundgaard off the top at 1:11.6498. Other drivers advancing into the Fast Six were Rosenqvist (1:11.7609), McLaughlin (1:12.0354), Ericsson (1:12.1818) and Power (1:12.1995).
The drivers that did not advance included Dixon (1:12.3123), Kirkwood, Grosjean, Armstrong, Newgarden and VeeKay.
“We should have done what some of the other drivers did by coming in and getting a new set of wet tires,” Dixon said. “It’s a shame because the car is fast, and we will start seventh. It’s annoying when you know you have a good car and can’t make the most out of it.”
Kirkwood will start eight with a fast lap of 1:12.3316.
“We know our car is super fast,” Kirkwood said. “It was good enough for the pole I the wet, but our timing was a little bit off.”