Ferrucci to Start from Seventh Row in Portland
Dale Coyne Racing’s Santino Ferrucci missed making it into the second round of qualifying aboard his #19 Cly-Del Manufacturing Honda by a mere tenth of a second on Saturday at Portland International Raceway. The rookie will be starting the penultimate round of the NTT IndyCar Series in 14th place.
Ferrucci took to the track in the second qualifying group and while he spent most of the 10-minute session in the top six, sitting as high as second at one point, his fastest lap of 57.8476 seconds wasn’t quick enough to allow him to move on to Round 2 of qualifying, in what is a very close field. The top seven drivers in his group were only separated by four tenths of a second.
“Qualifying went well, but we just didn’t have enough in our #19 Cly-Del Manufacturing Honda today,” said Ferrucci. “We’re trying really hard, but the margins are so small here between all cars and we didn’t have what it takes to move into the next round. We’ll start from 14th and just have to pass some cars. Our race cars have normally been good all year, so I’m not too worried about it for tomorrow.”
The Dale Coyne Racing driver currently leads the Rookie of the Year standings by two points and sits ninth in the overall driver Championship with 326 points.
The Grand Prix of Portland is scheduled to go green on Sunday, September 1 and will be broadcast live on NBC starting at 3pm ET (Noon local).