The 2017 IndyCar season is in its 17th and final race with the GoPro Grand Prix of Sonoma at Sonoma Raceway. Who will start where in tomorrow’s race?
Team Penske’s Josef Newgarden topped this weekend’s IndyCar qualifying session at Sonoma Raceway in Sonoma, California with a top lap speed of 113.691 miles per hour (75.5205 seconds) around the 11-turn, 2.385-mile natural terrain road course, a new track record.
Newgarden, the leader of the championship standings, will start from the pole position for just the second time in his IndyCar career in tomorrow’s season finale. His other pole position came at Milwaukee in 2015.
Newgarden led a top 4 Team Penske Chevrolet sweep of the session, with Will Power, Simon Pagenaud and Helio Castroneves qualifying in 2nd, 3rd and 4th place, respectively, giving the team a sweep of the first two rows on the starting grid.
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The highest qualifying Honda driver was Takuma Sato, who will start the race in 5th place. Honda drivers took eight of the top 12 and 11 of the top 15 spots on the speed chart despite the fact that they did not take a single spot in the top 4. They took every spot from 5th down through 12th.
The highest qualifying non-Team Penske Chevrolet driver was AJ Foyt Enterprises’ Conor Daly, who qualified in 13th place. Sebastien Bourdais qualified in 10th in his Dale Coyne Racing Honda in just his third race back from his nasty wreck in Indianapolis 500 qualifying. Bourdais’ teammate Ed Jones, the lone full-time rookie in the series, qualified in 18th.
Jack Harvey, who is making his second substitution appearance for Schmidt Peterson Motorsports this season, qualified in 19th place in his Honda car. Zachary Claman DeMelo, who is making his IndyCar debut in a Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing Honda, qualified in 21st. You can see full qualifying results and a starting grid from the qualifying session at Sonoma here.
The final warm-up for the race will be held tomorrow at 2:30 PM ET before the 85-lap race itself begins at 6:43 PM ET. The race will be broadcast live on NBCSN starting at 6:30 PM ET.
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