Scott McLaughlin, a 30-year-old from New Zealand, will be at the front of the pack when the Indy 500 begins. He’ll be leading 33 cars for the 200-lap, 500-mile race. His team, Penske, did really well, with Will Power starting from the middle of the front row and Josef Newgarden on the outside.
During the Fast Six qualifying, McLaughlin did his runs after Power and Newgarden. He did some really fast laps, averaging around 234.220mph for four laps. That’s a new record. Power was a bit slower, averaging around 233.917mph, and Newgarden was even slower at 233.808mph. Alexander Rossi from Arrow McLaren did the next best, but he was still a bit slower than McLaughlin. Kyle Larson, a NASCAR star, also did great, coming in fifth.
In the Top 12 qualifying, McLaughlin did another fast run, averaging around 233.492mph. This time, he beat Power by a tiny margin of 0.0056s. Newgarden came in third again, but he was over a tenth of a second slower. Some big names missed the cut, like Rinus VeeKay, Pato O’Ward, Felix Rosenqvist, and Takuma Sato.
On the first day of qualifying, Power was the fastest, with a speed of 233.758mph. McLaughlin and Newgarden followed him. Some well-known drivers like Colton Herta and Alex Palou missed the Top 12, but they still got decent starting positions.
During the last-chance qualifying, Marcus Ericsson had a scare when he miscounted his laps but managed to secure a good position. Graham Rahal also had a tough time, and Katherine Legge surprisingly hit the top spot despite some scary moments on the track. Unfortunately, rookie Nolan Siegel crashed during his final attempt but thankfully wasn’t hurt.
