Qualifying Report: Good Ranchers 250 at Phoenix Raceway

AVONDALE, Ariz. (March 6, 2026) -- Santino Ferrucci and rookie Caio Collet will look to charge forward in the Good Ranchers 250 at Phoenix Raceway tomorrow after a challenging qualifying session on the one mile oval this afternoon. They will start 21st and 23rd respectively.

Ferrucci, who earned the nickname of Passmaster because of the amount of cars he would pass as he made his way to the front, opined that he would be adding to his stats with tomorrow's race.

"The car was pretty tight in [turns] one and two, and I nearly spun it in [turns] three and four, trying to make adjustments," he explained afterwards. "And then on lap two, you cook the tires when you do stuff like that, so I was just hanging on.  We'll just pass a lot of cars tomorrow in the Homes For Our Troops Chevy. It'll be fun."

Driving the No. 4 Combitrans Amazonia Chevrolet, Collet, who will start directly behind his teammate, will get a bird's eye view of Ferrucci slicing his way through traffic.

"I"ve been struggling to get the confidence to turn in with a lot of speed, something that I had in the test [last month]," Collet revealed. "And I think this morning, we just couldn't get it the same. So, a bit tricky coming into qualifying. Definitely left a little bit on the table as well. But I think we're just a bit too far from being competitive, just something that we need to work on this afternoon, and hopefully we can turn it around for tomorrow's race."

David Malukas, who came close several times to winning pole positions last year, turned the trick here today to earn the NTT P1 award pole with a two-lap average speed of 175.383 mph edging out his teammate Josef Newgarden by nearly a mile an hour in speed. Newgarden turned in a speed of 174.548 mph. Rounding out the top five were Graham Rahal, rookie teammate Mick Schumacher and Scott Mclaughlin, teammate to the front row.

The teams have a final practice this afternoon before tomorrow's race which will be broadcast on FOX starting at 3 p.m. ET.