Second and Third for Herta, Harvey and Honda in Qualifying at Road America
Road America
・Colton Herta to start on the outside of the front row at REV Group Grand Prix
・Jack Harvey qualifies on the inside of the second row
・Alex Palou looks to reclaim championship lead from fifth on the grid
Colton Herta set the pace for Honda in qualifying for the REV Group Grand Prix of Road America, qualifying on the outside of the front row for Sunday's race in the #26 Andretti Autosport Honda.
A race winner already this year on the streets of St. Petersburg, Florida, Herta hopes to add to his win total for the 2021 NTT INDYCAR SERIES season around the four-mile Road America circuit. Lining up just behind in the third position will be Meyer Shank Racing's Jack Harvey, looking for his first career victory in INDYCAR competition. Chip Ganassi Racing's Alex Palou, winner at the season-opening race at Barber Motorsports Park, will start fifth. Palou currently sits second in the championship points standings, just one point back from Pato O'Ward.
Honda also placed four additional drivers in the top-12, giving HPD an edge seven-to-five in the top 12 spots, with ex-F1 driver Romain Grosjean seventh, Ryan Hunter-Reay eighth, Alexander Rossi ninth and Ed Jones in twelfth.
Fast Facts
・Honda Indy car drivers have scored seven victories at Road America, including a clean sweep of both rounds in 2020's doubleheader race weekend. Eventual series champion Scott Dixon won Saturday's opening race; with his then-Chip Ganassi Racing teammate Felix Rosenqvist claiming victory in Sunday's event.
・In 2019, Alexander Rossi dominated at Road America leading 54 of the 55 laps for a crushing, 28-second margin of victory in his Andretti Autosport Honda.
I think it's difficult either way [red or black tires]. As we saw, I think today Josef made the right call with the new blacks, and that was the better play. Unfortunately, we didn't have a new set—we thought about saving a set from practice but we didn't end up doing that. But still, good car, and starting second it's going to be an interesting one for sure. I have to thank Gainbridge and I'm happy to be powered by Honda around here.
It is going to be a difficult race. What we are going to have to see during the warm up is how much [tire] deg we get and if we get enough to turn this into a four-stop race. We'll have to wait and see and go through all of our options, it was a really good qualifying car, but we'll have to really nail this thing down at the rear end to get it ready for the race.
That was a pretty good run and our black [Firestone primary tire] pace was really strong. I think we left a bunch [of speed] ‘on the table' during Practice, so we kind of hoped that if we put everything together that we would transfer into the Fast Six. To start third here is pretty awesome. I could have done a few things better here and there in the Fast Six [final qualifying] to maybe get a little bit closer to Josef [Newgarden, pole qualifier]. But everyone at Meyer Shank Racing has been working really hard. I know we've has some unfortunate results, but the mental discipline on the team has kept us going. I think we have the makings of a great car for the race, so we'll go and get it.
