Qualifying Report: Freedom 250 Grand Prix

WASHINGTON, D.C. (Aug. 22, 2026) -- Rookie Caio Collet continues to impress on new street circuits as he advanced to the Fast 12 in qualifying for the inaugural Freedom 250 Grand Prix in the heart of the Nation's capital.

Winding around the 1.7-mile, 7-turn street course set among the historic buildings and monuments of the city, Collet set his quickest time in the first round where he was second in his group of 12 with a lap time of 57.2617 seconds (106.878 mph). In round 2, he went a bit slower much to his dismay. He qualified 11th in the No. 4 Combitrans Amazonia Chevrolet with a lap time of 57.7407 (105.991mph).

"Quite decent. Just couldn't really extract a lot of lap time in the Fast 12," Collet remarked afterwards. "We need to understand why. We put new tires on and somehow we went a little bit slower. So just trying to analyze that, see what happened. Not a bad place to start - 11th. So hopefully we can have a clean race tomorrow."

Santino Ferrucci qualified 22nd in the No.14 Homes For Our Troops Chevrolet after brushing the wall in his first segment of the round. The impact was enough to knock the car's front toe-in out of line, which wasn't detected until the crew examined the car in the paddock after their session. Ferrucci changed to a second set of Firestone alternate-compound tires but he did not get a chance to improve his time, because the red flag came out for another competitor. He will also take a six-spot grid penalty for an unapproved engine change which puts him at the tail end of the 25-car field.

"The only positives are that we’re racing in D.C. right now," said Ferrucci. "I hit the wall on the first set [of tires]. Put on the second set, but people go off in front of you, and then it goes red, so you just don't get another lap.  It's just a terrible situation to be put in, insanely unfortunate.  So, we’ll just see what happens in the race. I need to be able to have a car to drive and not stuff it in the wall. We’ve got a lot of work to do tonight."

Alex Palou won the NTT P1 Award for the seventh time this season. Kyle Kirkwood, Scott McLaughlin, Christian Rasmussen, Marcus Armstrong and David Malukas rounded out the Firestone Fast Six.

The teams will have a morning warm-up before the 147-lap race. The Freedom 250 Grand Prix pre-race show will be broadcast on FOX starting at 11:30 a.m. ET with race coverage beginning at 1 p.m. ET.