Barber – Qualifying: O' Ward on pole, Grosjean bluffing

Pato O' Ward secured the first pole of the season at Barber Motorsports Park with a best lap of 1:05. He beat Alexander Red (Andretti Autosport), and Alex Palou (Chip Ganassi Racing), the latter very lively throughout the day on Saturday. 

This is the second pole of the young Mexican's career, after the one obtained during race 2 of Road America last season.

Romain Grosjean amazed the paddock from the first segment of qualifying, where only O' Ward did better than the Frenchman, within group 2, which brought together 12 drivers. Still in the running in Q2, the Frenchman however failed to participate in Fast6. Seventh, he was the last to be excluded in a particularly contested qualification, since only 6/1000ths deprived him of Q3. 

Starting on the fourth row nonetheless remains a very good result for the debut of the man who celebrated his 35th birthday on Saturday. “What we showed is really very good, the Frenchman rejoiced, I am proud of the team, P7 just ahead of Newgarden, who is one of the stars of theIndyCar, this shows that we worked well during our tests».
 

Checkered flag on round 2. Grosjean ends up 7th, missed out on the Fast 6 by 0.06 seconds. Great qualifying run by our rookie!#IndyCar

- Dale Coyne Racing (@DaleCoyneRacing) April 17, 2021

The other French people were less happy. Within the same qualifying group as Grosjean, Sébastien Bourdais failed to qualify for Q2.

He will start from the eighth row, alongside simon pagenaud, who was present in group 1 and was the furthest behind the Team Penske drivers. 

The grid will start on Sunday at 21:30 p.m. The opportunity for Grosjean to strike a big blow?