AutoAction
FREE DIGITAL MAGAZINE SIGN UP

Power gets strong grid spot for IndyCar finale

By Thomas Miles

Date posted: 15 September 2024

Australia’s Will Power has put himself in a strong position to challenge Alex Palou for the 2024 IndyCar title after Nashville qualifying.

Power will start the Big Machine Music City Grand Prix from fourth place, while leader Palou could only manage 15th as Scott McLaughlin was ninth.

If Power wins, Palou, who currently leads by 33 points, must gain six more spots and finish ninth or better to hold onto the IndyCar title.

Kyle Kirkwood of Andretti Global earned his second career pole with a total time of 47.5189s across the two laps.

Power’s 47.7301 was enough for fourth also behind Josef Newgarden and Felix Rosenqvist.

The Aussie, chasing a third IndyCar title, said he gave it everything. 

“The lap, couldn’t have done anymore. That was as much as we had,” Power said. 

“It was as fast as we could go. Wasn’t quite good enough. 

“It’s a different package (since last race here in 2008), the car is ultimately just heavier now. 

“The track I really like. It’s a really nice track. Really nice having a cement track. 

“It’ll be interesting to see after practice how well it races. 

“We have a high-line (practice), see if it’s nice in the high-line and rubber that in, make it a good race.”

Palou knows winning a third title in four years is no certainty.

“It wasn’t ideal,” Palou said. 

“It was a lot more comfortable this morning during practice, so we don’t really know what happened to the 10 car. 

“The first lap wasn’t too bad, then the second lap was really, really bad. Not what we wanted, not what we needed.

“It’s not making it easier, for sure. It’s time to see what we can do. 

“Hopefully we can make up some spots. The car was really good this morning.”

The 2024 IndyCar title will be decided with the Big Machine Music City Grand Prix at 4.45 am AEST Monday, September 16 broadcast on Stan Sport.

Image: Photo by Jake Galstad / LAT Images Motorsport Images

IndyCar Nashville Qualifying Results

2024 Sandown 500

Practice 1: 1: C. Waters 1:08.7478 2: C. Mostert +0.1445 3: D. Reynolds +0.1834 

Practice 2: 1: S. Pye 1:08.8398 2: D. Fraser +0.0780 3: D. O’Keeffe +0.0785

Practice 3: 1: J. Le Brocq 1:08.2772 2: W. Brown +0.0394 3: A. Heimgartner +0.1377

Practice 4: 1: R. Stanaway 1:14.4910 2: B. Feeney +0.0361 3: L. Holdsworth +0.0422

Practice 5: 1: W. Brown 1:13.0865 2: R. Stanaway +0.1550 3: M. Payne +0.1586

Qualifying: 1: B. Feeney 1:12.8980 2: C. Mostert +0.0404 3: M. Payne +0.0879

Top 10 Shootout: 1: W. Brown 1:10.2549 2: C. Waters +0.0647 3: A. De Pasquale +0.1015

Warm up: Sun 9.55

Race: Sun 14.05 161 laps

READ THE LATEST ISSUE OF AUTO ACTION HERE

Don’t forget the print edition of Auto Action available via subscription here. For more of the latest motorsport news, subscribe to AUTO ACTION magazine.

Shares

Recent Stories

array (
  0 => 
  WP_Term::__set_state(array(
     'term_id' => 1530,
     'name' => 'Indycar',
     'slug' => 'indycar',
     'term_group' => 0,
     'term_taxonomy_id' => 1530,
     'taxonomy' => 'category',
     'description' => '',
     'parent' => 660,
     'count' => 390,
     'filter' => 'raw',
     'cat_ID' => 1530,
     'category_count' => 390,
     'category_description' => '',
     'cat_name' => 'Indycar',
     'category_nicename' => 'indycar',
     'category_parent' => 660,
  )),
  1 => 
  WP_Term::__set_state(array(
     'term_id' => 11,
     'name' => 'Latest News',
     'slug' => 'latest-news',
     'term_group' => 0,
     'term_taxonomy_id' => 11,
     'taxonomy' => 'category',
     'description' => '',
     'parent' => 0,
     'count' => 15512,
     'filter' => 'raw',
     'cat_ID' => 11,
     'category_count' => 15512,
     'category_description' => '',
     'cat_name' => 'Latest News',
     'category_nicename' => 'latest-news',
     'category_parent' => 0,
  )),
  2 => 
  WP_Term::__set_state(array(
     'term_id' => 2029,
     'name' => 'ZZZ-Email',
     'slug' => 'email',
     'term_group' => 0,
     'term_taxonomy_id' => 2029,
     'taxonomy' => 'category',
     'description' => '',
     'parent' => 2031,
     'count' => 6101,
     'filter' => 'raw',
     'cat_ID' => 2029,
     'category_count' => 6101,
     'category_description' => '',
     'cat_name' => 'ZZZ-Email',
     'category_nicename' => 'email',
     'category_parent' => 2031,
  )),
  3 => 
  WP_Term::__set_state(array(
     'term_id' => 2031,
     'name' => 'ZZZ-RSSFeeds',
     'slug' => 'zzz-rssfeeds',
     'term_group' => 0,
     'term_taxonomy_id' => 2031,
     'taxonomy' => 'category',
     'description' => '',
     'parent' => 0,
     'count' => 5470,
     'filter' => 'raw',
     'cat_ID' => 2031,
     'category_count' => 5470,
     'category_description' => '',
     'cat_name' => 'ZZZ-RSSFeeds',
     'category_nicename' => 'zzz-rssfeeds',
     'category_parent' => 0,
  )),
)
88366

Meet Team 18’s New Co-drivers

Team 18 has turned to the past and the future for its all new co-driver line up in 2025 featuring the experienced Lee Holdsworth and rookie Harri Jones. Holdsworth is […]

Waters takes a hat-trick of poles

Cam Waters’ pursuit of a perfect weekend in Sydney remains intact after he took pole in a rapid Shootout. Waters denied Broc Feeney once again, this time by a tenth […]

Rossi

ROSSI THRILLED WITH PODIUM, BUT WILL BE BACK

Valentino Rossi has an extraordinary list of achievements in Australia with five MotoGP wins at Phillip Island, but now he can add some Bathurst silverware to that. On his third […]

Classic stripes for Heimgartner

Andre Heimgartner will have a new tweak to his familiar #8 Supercars livery as R&J Batteries celebrates a milestone. For his fourth season at Brad Jones Racing, Heimgartner will retain […]