INDYCAR: Graham Rahal Earns Pole at Indianapolis Road Course - Full Qualifying Results

Full results from qualifying at Indianapolis, where DRIVER earned pole position for the race.

Graham Rahal felt the lowest of lows at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in May. The veteran driver was bumped from the Indianapolis 500 in qualifying, by his RLL Racing teammate. The entire organization struggled to find speed, but that was certainly not the case today on the road course. Rahal earned his first pole position in six years as the RLL team locked out the front row in qualifying on the 2.439-mile circuit. Race winner Christian Lundgaard narrowly missed the top spot but will start alongside his teammate tomorrow.

Row 2 belongs to Arrow McLaren, as defending race winner Alexander Rossi and teammate Pato O’Ward qualified up front. Keeping with the theme, Andretti Autosport drivers owned Row 3 in qualifying. It wasn’t either of their top-two drivers though, as both Devlin DeFrancesco and Romain Grosjean made the Firestone Fast Six. Rookie Marcus Armstrong had another great performance and starts 7th while Jack Harvey put the cherry on top for RLL on Friday. Championship leader Alex Palou and Felix Rosenqvist rounded out the top-ten in qualifying.

Team Penske was nowhere to be found in qualifying, as none of their drivers cracked the top-ten. It was a bizarre qualifying session on multiple fronts. A majority of the top talent in the series will be starting in the back half of the field on Saturday. Scott Dixon, Will Power, Marcus Ericsson, and Josef Newgarden have all won the Indy 500 and combined, they have accounted for ten championships. All of them will start outside of the top 15 tomorrow.

Dixon and Palou got Ganassi back on track in final practice, as they led the session. They were followed by Scott McLaughlin, Callum Ilott, and Kyle Kirkwood. Three drivers (Jack Harvey, Helio Castroneves, David Malukas) will all serve a six-spot grid penalty for engine changes. Castroneves announced today that he will move into an ownership role with the Meyer Shank Racing team next season. Tom Blomqvist will replace him full-time in the No. 06 car but the four-time Indy 500 winner will still have a ride for that race.

There is a belief that this could be the final race for IndyCar on the road course, outside of the Month of May. This is the doubleheader weekend with NASCAR, but the stock car series is likely to return to the 2.5-mile oval next season, and IndyCar could replace this race with a return to Milwaukee. Following tomorrow’s race, only three races remain on the 2023 calendar.

Previous IMS Road Course winners

2023: Alex Palou

2022: Alexander Rossi

2022: Colton Herta

2021: Will Power

2021: Rinus VeeKay

2020: Will Power

2020: Josef Newgarden

2020: Scott Dixon

2019: Simon Pagenaud

2018: Will Power

2017: Will Power

2016: Simon Pagenaud

2015: Will Power

2014: Simon Pagenaud