St Pete IndyCar: McLaughlin beats Power, Herta to take first pole

Andretti Autosport’s Romain Grosjean was the first driver to duck below the 60sec mark in the final segment of qualifying, as all six drivers took to the track on reds.

Herta then hit the top with a 59.7104 which was eclipsed by Will Power delivering a 59.6847sec lap and then improving to a 59.6058sec. But the nine-time St. Pete polesitter had gotten sideways in Turn 9 on his best lap, and that opened the door for his teammate. An error-free lap from McLaughlin saw him beat Power by 0.1237sec to clock a 59.4821sec, an average of 108.940mph around the 1.8-mile course, in his first race with race engineer Ben Bretzman.

Rinus VeeKay ensured three Chevrolets in the top four with a 59.8102sec, the Ed Carpenter Racing driver beating Grosjean and Simon Pagenaud’s Meyer Shank Racing-Honda.

Alex Palou and Marcus Ericsson elected to take Firestone’s softer ‘reds’ right from the start of the Q2 segment, although Herta and eclipsed them even on primaries.

Will Power would land the fastest primary lap, however, with a 60.0727sec, before pitting for a set of alternates. He then got his time down to 59.3466 to top the segment by just 0.0585sec ahead of Colton Herta, with Scott McLaughlin a brilliant third.

Also advancing to the Firestone Fast Six were Romain Grosjean, Simon Pagenaud, with Rinus VeeKay of Ed Carpenter Racing.

The Ganassi cars faltered at this stage but were still much stronger than in yesterday’s practice, Scott Dixon, Marcus Ericsson and Alex Palou finishing up seventh, eighth and 10th respectively. Dixon admitted he’d clipped the wall on Turn 9 entry while on primaries and then mis-timed his flyers on the stickier-for-2022 ‘red’ Firestones.

Surprisingly eliminated at this stage was Penske’s Josef Newgarden, a two-time