Qualifying Report: Honda Indy 200

LEXINGTON, Ohio—Disappointment and frustration summed up the feelings in the Foyt camp after qualifying today at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, the picturesque, 13-turn, 2.258-mile permanent road course, nestled halfway between Cleveland and Columbus.

It was particularly frustrating for Matheus Leist whose No. 4 ABC Supply Chevrolet seemed to improve over the course of the weekend from where he started Friday morning. Leist was 19th in the first practice and seventh in the second practice-- a bit misleading since not all drivers got the opportunity to run the quicker red tires due to a red flag incident. In the third practice, Leist was a solid 14th.

“Disappointing qualifying today,” said Leist, who will start 21st. “Very disappointing, considering we were running in or near the top 12 most of the time here. The car felt pretty good for most of the run but we are lacking getting the speed out of the car. We have one more practice tomorrow to figure it out before the race.”

For Tony Kanaan, the weekend has been one long struggle. He will start 23rd in tomorrow’s race.

“Too many things happening but I don’t think we found the setup. I thought we did,” Kanaan said after his qualifying run. “We were planning to do three laps (on the red alternate tires), we got caught in traffic - but that’s nobody’s fault – and we ended up only doing two. It was not a good day. We only have one way to go and that’s moving to the front. We have a warm-up (final practice) tomorrow and hopefully we’ll do a better job tomorrow than we did today.”

Will Power won the pole with a lap time of 1 minute, 5.1569 seconds (124.757mph). Completing the Firestone Fast Six were: Alexander Rossi, Josef Newgarden, Simon Pagenaud, Sebastien Bourdais and Felix Rosenqvist.

There will be a 30-minute warm-up at 12 noon tomorrow providing a final opportunity for the teams to fine-tune their cars. The Honda Indy 200 will be broadcast live on NBC starting at 4 p.m. ET. It will also be available on the Advance Auto Parts INDYCAR Radio Network and SiriusXM Radio, Channel 209.