Saturday’s qualifying session from the streets of Toronto began under dry conditions, but a heavy rain shower moved through just as the first round was ending to throw a wrench into everyone’s plans.
The tricky course was made even more treacherous by the weather, but Christian Lundgaard was able to master the conditions to earn his second pole of the season.
The sophomore driver completed his best lap on a drying track in 1:04.1567, three tenths of a second faster than everyone else.
READ MORE: IndyCar Toronto – Full Qualifying Results
Scott McLaughlin was the second quickest driver of the afternoon, and was able to keep his position despite losing an early lap time for impeding Marcus Ericsson.
The Arrow McLaren team had the boldest strategy of the day, sending Pato O’Ward out on slick tires from the outset in the final session as the track was still drying.
He was able to quickly set the fastest time, and only dropped down a bit as others got their own slick tires up to temperature as time expired on the session. O’Ward will start from the third position.
Marcus Ericsson earned the fourth position with his fast time, just ahead of Felix Rosenqvist in fifth.
Will Power rounded out the Fast Six, with the all-time record pole winner advancing to the final round for the first time this season.
Scott Dixon just missed advancing to the Firestone Fast Six, missing the cut in the second round by just over one tenth of a second.
Rossi suffered electrical problems and was not able to advance out of the first round. Photo: IndyCar
Alex Palou was one of the drivers hurt most by the onset of the rain, which came right in the final minute of the first round.
The current points leader was unable to improve his time as the session expired, and he will have to start from 15th, his lowest qualifying position of the season.
Multiple drivers spun in the second segment of the first session, and many of those were given penalties for impeding others. There were so many that there was a considerable delay as all the penalties were sorted out by race control.
Colton Herta was one that was given penalties for his spins, and had to settle for a 14th grid position after being one of the fastest drivers in dry conditions.
Two of his Andretti Autosport team-mates made it to the second round, but could not advance to the Fast Six. Kyle Kirkwood and Romain Grosjean will start from eighth and ninth respectively.
Tom Blomqvist was able to impressively keep his #60 entry out of the wall despite it being his first IndyCar qualifying session. The IMSA star driver qualified 20th for his debut race in the series.
Drivers will have one more short practice session on Sunday morning before the 85-lap race gets under way at 1:45 PM Eastern.
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