Will Power and last week’s Indy 500 winner Takuma Sato each earned pole for the two doubleheader races from WWT Raceway at Gateway, with speeds of 182.394 MPH and 182.499 MPH respectively.
In front of sparsely-populated stands, a single qualifying session for the third doubleheader weekend of the 2020 IndyCar season took place just outside of a windy St. Louis, Missouri.
Power was happy to have turned his fortunes around after struggling throughout the whole two-week event at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The 2014 champion will try for his first win of the year from pole in the first race, and will start third for the race on Sunday.
Sato, however, had a great time at Indianapolis while earning his second Indy 500 victory, and will look to continue that good form from fifth in the first race and from pole in the second.
The efficient format led to vastly different grids for the two races of the doubleheader weekend as the drivers did their best to string together two perfect laps on the tricky 1.25-mile oval.
Defending champion Josef Newgarden will find himself on the front row for the second 200-lap race, but will start back in sixth for the first race.
Zach Veach is another driver that will have two different views at the start of each of the races after he got loose on his first lap and had to get out of the throttle momentarily. A good recovery on his second lap, however, means he will start from the final position on Saturday and from 17th on Sunday.
Graham Rahal, who finished on the podium for last week’s Indy 500, struggled with grip and will start the two races from right at the back of the field.
Ryan Hunter-Reay’s crew seems to have solved his brake issues from practice yesterday, with the 39-year-old putting his Andretti Autosport Honda in the middle of the field.
Race one gets underway in just over two hours at 15:45 EDT (20:45 BST), with race two taking place Sunday at the same time.
