PORTLAND, Oregon – When the top two drivers in NTT IndyCar Series points did not advance out of the first qualifying group Saturday, they missed a major opportunity to improve in the championship race.
Team Penske driver Josef Newgarden enters Sunday’s Grand Prix of Portland as the leader in the standings. He leads teammate Simon Pagenaud by 38 points with two races remaining.
Both drivers could not advance out of Round 1 and that leaves Newgarden starting 13th and Pagenaud 18th in the starting lineup.
Newgarden’s best time in the No. 2 Hitachi Chevrolet was 57.9585 around the 12-turn, 1.964-mile Portland International Raceway for a lap at 121.991 mph. Pagenaud’s No. 22 Team Menard’s Chevrolet was 57.9479 (122.013 mph).
Alexander Rossi, who is third in the standings, made it into the group of 12 and was the first driver bounced out of making the Firestone Fast Six. Rossi starts seventh in a Honda with a best lap of 57.8864 (122.143 mph).
Rookie driver Colton Herta won the pole at 57.8111 (122.302 mph) in the No. 88 Honda.
Pagenaud admitted he didn’t have much to say as he walked down pit lane back to his team’s transporter.
“It just wasn’t good enough,” Pagenaud told NTT INDYCAR Mobile. “It’s that simple. If it was good, we’d be P1.
“Strategy will be interesting. Anything can happen at this point. It’s a shame we weren’t fast enough in qualifying, but nothing is over. We’ll fight to the end. We have to make the car better and put me in a better spot. We have to find more consistency in the car. It’s not what I need.”
Pagenaud’s engineer, Ben Bretzman, had a bit more to say about the qualification setup.
“Simon wasn’t super comfortable on the switch from Firestone blacks to the reds,” he said. “It shows how tight (the field) is. If you don’t put it all together, a couple tenths of a second will keep you out.
“It was an opportunity lost, but last year there were so many yellows, it turned the grid upside-down. We’ll see what we have here tomorrow.”
Bretzman said the car didn’t feel good in the Turns 10, 11 and 12 area of the race course.
“It’s not an easy track,” Bretzman said. “There are a couple places you can pass and that’s it.”
Newgarden remains the points leader but will have to pedal his way up through the field.
“It’s a shame -- we had a fast car, but it’s tighter here than anywhere else as far as getting a lap together,” Newgarden told NTT INDYCAR Mobile. “I made a couple of mistakes and that is critical here.
“The car was good; the car was fine. I just made a mistake. I dropped a wheel at Turn 7 and that is one-tenth and then I dropped a wheel at Turn 12 and that is a tenth.
“You just have to be perfect and it wasn’t perfect on my side. Now, we have two more sets of Firestone Reds for the race so we will see how that plays out.”
Team Penske President Tim Cindric calls the strategy for Newgarden and said the focus is now on making up the gap in the race.
“We just didn’t put the right lap together at the right time and we just missed it,” Cindric told NTT INDYCAR Mobile. “It’s all pretty close.
“Fortunately, it’s not over today. The other guys, mainly Rossi, qualified in front of us. Hopefully, we’ll put together a solid day on Sunday and try to get maximum points. If this thing becomes a two-stop race, which it could be, you would definitely want to start up front tomorrow.”