Palou beats O'Ward in Grand Prix of Indianapolis Qualifying

Credit: Dominic Loyer

Álex Palou was untouchable Saturday morning as he secured pole position for IndyCar's 2026 Grand Prix of Indianapolis. O'Ward will start behind him in second, with Felix Rosenqvist in third. See how it all panned out below.

Group 1

Qualifying was originally set to take place early Friday evening, but rain pushed the schedule back, and it was moved to 10:45 Saturday morning. It was sunny and dry as the drivers in the first group of qualifying took to the track to set their lap times.

There was a technical glitch somewhere that stopped timings being available to the teams, drivers and broadcasters alike, so everyone was blind for the first few minutes of qualifying as everyone scrambled to find the running order.

When timings were made available with around five minutes left on the clock, Alex Rossi was at the top ahead of Scott McLaughlin and Scott Dixon. Still, with a few minutes to go, everyone looked able to improve.

Or at least they looked able, but while O'Ward in fourth, Kyle Kirkwood in seventh and Dixon in third all looked quick, none of them were able to go fastest than their previous time, much less Rossi's time.

But the final runs were a rush of improvement, Christian Rasmussen jumping up to second before dropping down the order down to tenth. Dixon and O'Ward both jumped up to the top three but it was Kirkwood whose time of 1:10.2017s topped the timing sheets when all was said and done.

Graham Rahal finished fourth, while Josef Newgarden and Caio Collet were the final two to make it through to the Fast 12, marking rookie Collet's first appearance in the second session of qualifying.

Rossi dropped down to finish in seventh, joining Santino Ferrucci, McLaughlin, Rasmussen, Rinus VeeKay and Sting Ray Robb on the list of drivers eliminated from the rest of qualifying.

Group 2

Credit: Dominic Loyer

The second group went out on track and began qualifying with much less technical difficulty than the first group, with Rosenqvist of Meyer Shank Racing as the early pacesetter before being overtaken by Team Penske's David Malukas.

Nolan Siegel was the first driver to set a time in the 1:10s range, going to the top ahead of Christian Lundgaard and Will Power. With less than three minutes to go, rookie Mick Schumacher was sitting in an impressive fourth, with big names like Rosenqvist and Palou sitting down at the bottom of the timing sheets.

With a minute left in the session it was Romain Grosjean who went fastest overall before Malukas went faster. Then it was Palou who, true to form, pulled out a lap time of 1:09.912s, the fastest time of the weekend so far, to go from dead last up to first and hold that position.

Malukas sat secure in second ahead of Rosenqvist and Louis Foster, as Grosjean and Lundgaard finished fifth and sixth to move forward to the Fast 12.

Andretti's Marcus Ericsson was less than a tenth slower than Lundgaard and the top driver to be eliminated. He finished seventh ahead of Siegel, Schumacher, Marcus Armstrong, Kyffin Simpson, Dennis Hauger and Will Power.

Fast 12

The top six drivers from both previous sessions were up next, looking for a chance to progress to the final session of qualifying and a chance to win pole position. Unsuprisingly, Palou was the driver quickest out of the gate, the first driver in the session to reach the 1:10s time before Kirkwood. Halfway through the session they ran with Rahal in third ahead of Newgarden, Collet and Malukas.

Drivers started their final runs and began improving with a minute to go, Palou beating his own time from Group 2 and going even faster to improve on his top spot. Rosenqvist and O'Ward jumped up to second place before Foster took the spot. Not long after, however, O'Ward grabbed it back on his last lap of the session.

In the final moments Rahal was sitting in sixth on the bubble, hoping to get through to the Fast 6 but Lundgaard, who had been sitting in 11th, jumped up to third ahead of Rosenqvist, Foster and Malukas to join the drivers who would progress to the final session of qualifying.

As a result, Rahal finished seventh where he will start the race this afternoon. Dixon, Newgarden, Grosjean, Collet and Kirkwood finished and will start behind him in that order.

Fast 6

With just one chance left to win pole position, the top six drivers of the day headed out on track. Malulas was the first driver to set a time before getting overtaken on the timing sheets by Foster. Rosenqvist was next and he slotted into third, before Palou went fourth. O'Ward first lap time put him third, and Lundgaard was running sixth before the final set of runs.

With less than a minute to go, Palou went to the top with a time of 1:10.011s. Malukas jumped up to third as the time ran out, just in time to secure one more lap. O'Ward's final lap put him up to second as Palou improved once more to make himself even more untouchable on provisional pole.

No one could beat O'Ward's time for second place in the final moments either, and he secured that place ahead of Rosenqvist in third. Lundgaad finished fourth, Malukas fifth, and Foster sixth.

The Indy GP will begin this afternoon with the broadcast starting at 16:30 local time in Indianapolis.