Alex Palou during practice on May 15 for the Indianapolis 500 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway (Photo: Anthony Sylvia | The Podium Finish).
Speedway, Ind. – Alex Palou put pressure on the rest of the field as he eyes his second career Indianapolis 500 pole. The first day of qualifying for the 109th Indianapolis 500 presented by Gainbridge brought on the drama and speed at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Palou, who has won four of the first five races this season, was the fastest driver on the opening day of PPG Presents Armed Forces Qualifying by turning a four-lap average speed of 233.043 mph on his lone attempt of the day in the No. 10 DHL Chip Ganassi Racing Honda.
Palou hit the track two hours after qualifying began on the 2.5-mile oval. The biggest challenge for the 34 drivers attempting to qualify was significant wind speeds of 15-20 mph, and gusting to nearly 30 mph.
“It’s tough conditions out there,” said Palou. “Yesterday it was with the temperature; today it was with the wind. The car has been good. We were struggling this morning (in practice). I was unable to finish a four-lap run. Now we were able to finish it quite strongly.”
“Super happy. I don’t know if there’s more speed in the car, but there’s always more. The line between more and too much is very thin here at IMS. We’ll see what we have for tomorrow.”
The top 12 fastest drivers from Saturday’s qualification session will participate in Top 12 qualifying on Sunday afternoon, which will lead to the Firestone Fast Six that will determine the pole sitter for the Indianapolis 500.
The day started with unfortunate circumstances for New Zealand native Marcus Armstrong, as during the morning practice session, his No. 66 Spectrum Meyer Shank Racing Honda lost the rear-end in turn one and slammed hard into the outside SAFER Barrier and slid through the south short chute and made contact with the Turn 2 SAFER Barrier.
Armstrong was extensively examined by the Indiana University Health infield care center doctors and later released and cleared to drive.
“Yeah, it’s hugely disappointing what happened this morning,” said Armstrong. “We had a very fast car. I think Felix (Rosenqvist) demonstrated that. I think he got the quickest lap of the day. He is P7 or something now. I think he and I were pretty much the same.”
“I don’t know why, honestly. I lost the car so suddenly. You could argue a bunch of things. Ultimately, we put a setup on the car that we thought was going to be reasonably conservative for the conditions, but ultimately that wasn’t the case.”
The second incident of the day came on Colton Herta’s first lap of his qualifying run when he lost control of the No. 26 Gainbridge Andretti Global Honda and slammed the turn one SAFER Barrier, flipping the car over on its top and slid top-first into the Turn 2 wall, the same area that Armstrong suffered his early morning practice accident, before coming to a screeching halt. Herta was able to climb from the car under his power and was checked and cleared by the IndyCar medical staff.
Colton Herta looks on as his Andretti Global crew repairs his damaged car from his qualifying accident on May 17 (Photo: Anthony Sylvia | The Podium Finish).
“Yeah, it sucks,” said Herta. “I think from our standpoint of where we want to be, what we want to contend with, we’re not happy just making the show. We want to fight for the pole, we want to be in the Fast 12. When we don’t get the chance to do that, it’s pretty disappointing.”
“What a heroic effort by the guys. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like that on any car. Bare chassis, bare tub in four and a half hours to a complete car. The only thing that we transferred over was the engine. Everything else was destroyed.”
Herta’s No. 26 Andretti Global team repaired the car from the ground up in roughly four hours to get another qualifying run in on the day to make the fast 12. The effort by the team did not go unnoticed when they rolled out to the qualifying line in front of a round of applause from the crowd. Herta managed to qualify the car in the 29th position with a four-lap average of 230.192 mph.
A total of 73 qualifying attempts were made on the day. The most exciting drive of the day for the hometown fans was that of native Hoosier Conor Daly attempting to bump his way into the 12th and final qualifying spot for Sunday’s fast 12 shootout. The Noblesville, Indiana native navigated his No. 76 AM/PM Juncos Hollinger Racing Chevrolet to the 12th position after his third of four laps with less than 15 minutes left of the day, but slowed enough on his final lap to slimly miss the top 12 by .0564 seconds.
“Yeah, I mean, honestly, we had a wild day,” said Daly. “Honestly, our first run, the whole front wing being wrong was crazy because we have to go to tech before we run, too. It was kind of a shame there.”
“We had to come back. In the middle of the day, we didn’t have exactly what we needed. We trimmed out for the last run just to try to stay above where we needed to be. I was trying a few different things to be as consistent as possible. Just happened not to get the weight jacket back in time. But, a good bounce back, for sure, for our group.”
The biggest surprise on the day was the speed found by the Prema Racing Team and rookie driver Robert Schwartzman. The Israeli-born driver is the first driver from Israel to qualify for the Indianapolis 500 in the No. 83 Prema Racing Chevrolet.
“Yeah, really good day,” said Schwartzman. “I honestly did not expect it to go that well. We were gradually improving the car step by step. To have such a good run this morning, I was like, Okay, this car is really fast.”
“I’m happy that I managed to complete all four laps. We’re going to the top 12. I think it’s also a good thing that it’s the first one of the team. We finally got a top 12, it’s here at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Quite a legendary moment for us.”
2021 NASCAR Cup Series champion Kyle Larson qualified 21st at 231.326 mph in the No. 17 HendrickCars.com Arrow McLaren Chevrolet. The reigning Indianapolis 500 Rookie of the Year is making his second attempt at the May 25 “double” of racing in the Indianapolis 500 and the Coca-Cola 600 NASCAR race that same evening at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Practice for the Top 12 will take place at 1 p.m. ET, with final practice for the Last Chance Qualifiers at 2 p.m. ET (both sessions air on FS2, FOX Sports app, and INDYCAR Radio Network). Top 12 Qualifying will begin at 4 p.m. ET, Last Chance Qualifying will begin at 5:15 p.m. ET, and the shootout for the pole will begin at 6:25 p.m. ET all on FOX and the SiriusXM IndyCar Radio Network channel 218.
