A rough season so far in 2023 for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, but after Lundgaard’s performance, there may be light at the end of the tunnel.
Christian Lundgaard in his No. 45 Honda led a resurgence from RLL during both practice sessions today. During qualifying, the RLL driver flexed his muscle and beat out Arrow McLaren driver Felix Rosenqvist in his No. 6 Smartshop Chevrolet by 0.0027 seconds to capture his 1st career pole for Saturday’s GMR Grand Prix at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course.
Qualifying started off with the 1st group of drivers consisting of Christain Lundgaard, Graham Rahal, Felix Rosenqvist, Marcus Armstrong, Will Power, Marcus Ericsson, Josef Newgarden, Devlin DeFrancesco, Rinus VeeKay, Simon Pagenaud, Conor Daly, Benjamin Pedersen, and Augustin Canapino. The top six that advanced to round 2 out of this group were Lundgaard, Rahal, Rosenqvist, Armstrong, Power & Ericsson.
Qualifying in group 2 was Pato O’Ward, Alexander Rossi, Alex Palou, Jack Harvey, Kyle Kirkwood, Scott Dixon, Colton Herta, Scott McLaughlin, Romain Grosjean, David Malukas, Sting Ray Robb, Callum Ilott, Helio Castroneves & Santino Ferrucci. The top six that advanced to round 2 out of this group were: O’Ward, Rossi, Palou, Harvey, Kirkwood & Dixon.
Round 2 of qualifying saw the following drivers advance to the Firestone Fast Six: Palou, Lundgaard, O’Ward, Rosenqvist, Harvey & Kirkwood.
It was then time to decide the NTT P1 Award in the Firestone Fast Six. That’s where Lundgaard outpaced the remaining five drivers on alternate red tires setting him up to be the driver leading the field into turn #1 on Saturday. Lundgaard laid down a hot lap of 01:09.3321 to which Rosenqvist could only follow up with a lap of 01:09.3348.
Up Next: Warm-up – 11:15 a.m ET live on Peacock and heard live on IndyCar Radio on Sirius XM
