Santino Ferrucci takes surprise pole in Portland IndyCar

Qualifying for the Portland Grand Prix promised to be very exciting, with the focus on finding the thousandths of a second. This was confirmed by the result of the second free practice, where the top fourteen drivers were within a tenth of a second of each other!

It quickly became clear in qualifying that even the smallest mistake could have major consequences. In qualifying group one, Christian Lundgaard surprisingly set the fastest lap, while he was completely uncompetitive in the free practice sessions. Other notable names in the top six of group one were Kyle Kirkwood and Santino Ferrucci.

In the second qualifying group, the fastest time, and less surprisingly, was Alex Palou, followed by the willpower and surprise of Marcus Armstrong. However, the big surprise of the first qualifying section was that Scott McLaughlin, who was held up by traffic and suffered a very large wheel spin at Turn 7 on his fastest lap, now had to start the race in 14th place.

Meyer-Schank Racing and McLaren also performed disappointingly in the first part. McLaren qualified no better than 18th (Alexander Rossi), while Meyer-Schank Racing remained stuck in 19th and 20th.

Rinus VeeKay also didn't make it through the first qualifying section. The Dutchman struggled with traffic on his first fast lap on the softer red tyres, and then his second lap was three-hundredths of a second too slow for a place in the Fast 12.

In fast qualifying 12 we saw a rare sight: Alex Palou went off the track at the last corner. The championship leader braked too late for this corner and slid straight into a pile of tyres which he hit at low speed. Fortunately for the Spaniard, this was early in the session; by bringing out the yellow flag, he lost his two fastest laps so far, but he was able to continue on his way.

The fastest time in the Fast 12 and also the fastest time of the weekend was set by Will Power, who was more than a tenth of a second quicker than the other 11 drivers with a 58.1196. Kirkwood was second fastest followed by Palou who recovered strongly from his crash. With the fifth fastest time of the session, Santino Ferrucci secured his first Fast Six qualifying for AJ Foyt Racing since Bourdais did so in 2021.

Of the drivers eliminated, the most notable was Colton Herta – the second-placed driver in the championship. The Andretti Global driver went off the track on his first lap on softer tires and spun heavily into Turn 7 on his fastest final lap, losing valuable time, just like McLaughlin before.

In the Firestone Fast 6, Palou led after the first series of qualifying laps, until to everyone's surprise Ferrucci was a tenth of a second faster. Power managed to match this time to within a few thousandths of a second, before Ferrucci – despite a left-front wheel failure – was able to shave a tenth off his fastest time. At that point, no one was on a faster lap, allowing Ferrucci to claim his first IndyCar pole position.

Full results from the playoffs in Portland