Oilpressure

There was a point in time today, that I was convinced that IndyCar Qualifying would be rained out and they would line up by points. I ate lunch at Honda Hospitality, just after the abbreviated practice session in the rain. As I walked over to the hospitality area, I was hunkered down under my umbrella. While I was eating, the heavens opened up. My watch said 12:30 and the radar looked ominous. Walking back to the stadium was just as dreary. Shortly after I got back to the media center, they announced that Qualifying would not start as scheduled and was on hold indefinitely. That’s when I thought that we were done for the day.

But the clouds parted a little before 3:00 and the sun came out – almost identically to what happened on Friday. Unfortunately, with the sun also came the heat and humidity. It was just as brutal wandering around the paddock as it was yesterday during practice.

By the time Qualifying started at 5:15 local time – the sun had gone behind the stadium to the point that it was really quite pleasant in the pits. It was almost like today was spread into three different days – the dreary rainy part, the brutally hot part, followed by the pleasant part for Qualifying. When I think back to leaving the house this morning in a downpour, it seems like it was it was a couple of days ago.

If you watched Qualifying on Peacock, I am told that within the first minute of the broadcast – there was a solo shot of me walking through the pits. My phone immediately started blowing up, so I knew something was up. I’ve not seen it yet, but you’ve been warned.

As for qualifying, there were a few surprises. The biggest surprise was near the end of Round Two, when Scott Dixon hit the Turn Eleven wall hard and brought out a red flag with 18 seconds left. David Malukas was sitting on the bubble in the sixth and Romain Grosjean was fifth. There were some fast cars on the outside looking in – most notably Will Power sitting in seventh, Kyle Kirkwood in eighth and Josef Newgarden in ninth. After the track was cleaned up, cars were allowed one more chance for a hot lap. I was standing directly behind the pit of David Malukas, and was shocked that they never sent him back out to try and improve. In my eyes, he was a sitting duck.

There’s a reason I’ve never been hired as a race strategist. As Malukas sat waiting for several drivers to take their shot at him and bump him out of the Firestone Fast Six, none of those fast cars advanced. They all missed the Fast Six, while Malukas and Dale Coyne made it. I find it interesting that ever since Malukas announced he would not be returning to Coyne, his season has turned around.

The Firestone Fast Six consisted of Pato O’Ward, Colton Herta, Alex Palou, Scott McLaughlin, Romain Grosjean and Malukas. That breaks down to one car each from Arrow McLaren, Chip Ganassi Racing, Team Penske and Dale Coyne Racing; plus two cars from Andretti Autosport. As far as engine manufacturers, it was four Hondas and two Chevys. But it was Chevy that swept the front row, with Scott McLaughlin taking his second Nashville pole with a time of 1:14.6099. Pato O’Ward will start alongside with a time about three-tenths slower than McLaughlin. Herta, Palou, Malukas and Grosjean make up the first three rows.

Special recognition should go to rookie driver Linus Lundqvist, who is starting his first-ever IndyCar race in place of Simon Pagenaud, who is still recovering from his violent shunt at Mid-Ohio. While the conditions how he obtained the ride are not ideal, he has made the most of this opportunity. He impressed in practice on Friday, and then advanced to Round Two in Qualifying. He will start eleventh, having out-qualified his teammate Helio Castroneves and a slew of experienced veterans and race winners. I’ll be keeping a close eye on Lundqvist in tomorrow’s race.

The fans who stuck around in the rain all day deserved a good show for qualifying. I think they got one. I am hopeful that tomorrow’s third and final race on this layout will silence those that love to call it a sh**show. If there are nine cautions again tomorrow – well, we can all take solace in the fact there will be a new layout in 2024 for the season-finale.

That’s going to do it for today. I am hoping that Susan will be able to join me here tomorrow – not only to have her here, but also because she takes much better pictures than I do. I have a few from today that I’ll post below. With such an early start (11:30 am green-flag local time), we will be here fairly early tomorrow. Let’s all keep our fingers crossed for a dry race. Thanks for following along today and yesterday. Please check back here in the morning.

George Phillips

This entry was posted on August 5, 2023 at 7:53 pm and is filed under IndyCar. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.