Ed Carpenter Racing’s Alexander Rossi has secured his second ever front row start at the most prestigious round of the IndyCar championship, the Indy 500. It’s his best ever Qualifying result at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, with his previous effort a third place almost ten years ago, back in 2017.
The 2016 Indy 500 race winner scraped his way in into the Fast 6 with the sixth fastest speed, but ultimately starting out as first in the final group recoded a very impressive average speed of 231.99mph. Only championship leader Alex Palou was able to improve that strong four lap run, nevertheless Rossi is still incredibly satisfied with his Indy 500 starting spot.
Unfortunately, only the day after on Monday the ECR man caused a huge collision during Practice 7, involving Pato O’Ward and Romain Grosjean as well. Rossi and his team have since announced that he has suffered from some non-serious injuries, and that the veteran American driver is still planning on driving in the upcoming Indy 500 on Sunday.
A great head start on the Indy 500 by Rossi
His positive feelings about his earlier Qualifying performance still stand, as during the Sunday press conference he had highlighted the happiness in himself and his colleagues alike following the awful Saturday weather conditions.
“No, I think it was an incredible day for everyone after the disappointment, obviously, of the wash-out yesterday, and seeing conditions that we hadn’t seen all month for the first time in qualifying, it’s pretty wild, but a huge testament to everyone on the 20 crew for staying with it and continuing to evolve and improve after each run.
“It’s no small feat around here. A great day. It’s not often that you are happy with second place, but with some of the challenges that everyone faced, this is a pretty cool one,” added Rossi, surprisingly satisfied with his run in spite of losing out to Palou.
Even if the track was significantly less damp, the IMS didn’t present the drivers with the easiest track conditions possible. In fact, the former Arrow McLaren driver mentioned the presence of severe bursts of wind, which increased the physicality of his performance.
“On days like this with the wind being as strong as it is, you know, both ends of the track behave differently. With the hybrid there’s different option that you have from a strategic standpoint during the run based on those conditions, and it’s always changing.
“You have to kind of manage that and stay on it of the balance of the car. But, yeah, like I said, it’s been an amazing car from a drivability standpoint, a speed standpoint all month. I would say today was our least competitive day from my side, so that’s really encouraging going into next week.”
Can he gun for the bigger prize?
In his opinion, the strong driving displayed on that occasion can be regarded as a positive signal ahead of the 110th running of the Indy 500 next Sunday. However, other factors will come into place, including the different asset of the grid during the 200 laps around the Speedway, consequently to be starting from the front row will be a significant advantage for Rossi.
”I don’t know that it is. I think it’s obviously great to be able to start pretty far forward here. As we all know, it’s challenging. It’s really hard to be in a big pack here. To be in the front group will really make your race day easier and allow you to be a little bit more aggressive on strategy.”
The ever-changing weather conditions encountered throughout the very different several practice session were an unforeseen benefit as well, with the drivers now having tested their challenger in a wider range of track temperatures, light intensity and moisture.
“It just gave us a bigger database, if you will to kind of draw from. That being said, today was still substantially different. We were still learning on the fly a little bit. It definitely was a benefit in terms of my comfort and various conditions and knowing what the car was capable of.”
A more challenging Qualifying format
On the other hand, Rossi admitted that the revised Qualifying format for the Indy 500, condensed in a single day had severely worried him, as it left no margin of error with only one lap attempt compared to the usual four in the all-grid segment.
“I think certainly the most stressful part of the day for me at least was the first run just because you didn’t have that security blanket of being able to go again. Usually in qualifying here, if you get a poor draw or not a very good draw, you can bounce back from it, because you’ve got hours to go out and make changes and improvements.
“It demanded very good execution from the team side and my side in order to ensure the transfer into the top 12. Then quite honestly, it was downhill from there.”
Finally, the former F1 driver explained the reasons behind his improvement between the Fast 12 and the Fast 6 sessions, stressing the importance of getting more tuned in with his car no.20 after a day without no track time.
“Just understanding more. Every run around here, you learn something new. It’s never the same just because the margins are so small. You start compiling the information, and you can kind of see what others are doing. Based on, you know, what you know you have, you can work to optimize it and maximize it, and that’s what we were able to do today.”
