Callum and Agustín content after Alabama qualifying

Callum Ilott will start tomorrow’s Children’s of Alabama Indy Grand Prix from P15, while Juncos Hollinger Racing team-mate Agustín Canapino will line up P22 on the grid.

Both men drove in separate qualifying groups at Barber Motorsports Park this afternoon and couldn’t quite find the performance they needed to break into the ‘Fast 12’ on the undulating 2.3-mile road course.

Using Firestone’s red-walled soft tire, Callum was eighth quickest in his group as he recorded a best lap of 1m 06.064s. The Briton was 0.475s off the ultimate pace in his #77 machine.

Agustín meanwhile, showed solid speed on his first visit to Barber. The Argentine rookie’s time of 1m 06.515s was nine tenths shy of the benchmark as his 10-minute session came to an end.

P15 \\ CALLUM ILOTT

“So, we start from P15. The car felt quite good and we improved a lot. It’s just missing in one or two areas right now. But overall, I’m happy with the progress we’ve been making and we’re heading in the right direction. I think this is a better track for us, especially in the race, and I think we’ll be okay. We’ve got a few things to work on overnight and I’m looking forward to tomorrow.”

P22 \\ AGUSTIN CANAPINO

“It was a good qualifying session and I’m really happy with the result. We improved a lot from practice to this point, so we will start tomorrow from P22 ahead of some much more experienced guys than me. Overall, I’m happy with that and tomorrow the ambition is to do a good race.”

TP \\ RICARDO JUNCOS

“I think we’ve improved the car a lot, bearing in mind we’re using different tires to last year, so we’re catching up a little bit. We were much faster on both cars this morning and I think Agustín was much happier in qualifying and I think Callum is happy also. For sure, we need to improve ahead of the warm-up tomorrow and continue the trend of finding more speed through the weekend. I’m looking forward to a good race tomorrow.”