Pato O’Ward has secured the final pole position of the season. The McLaren driver was 0.15 seconds quicker than the rest of the field over two laps in qualifying at Nashville Superspeedway. David Malukas will start second – just like last week – ahead of Christian Lundgaard and Alex Palou.

As is customary on oval circuits, this qualifying session was contested over two laps, with all drivers running in reverse championship order.

Of the last ten drivers in the standings, only Nolan Siegel managed to put in a surprisingly quick lap. With an average speed of 201.375 mph, he was only slightly slower than his best effort in practice.

The first serious contender for pole, Josef Newgarden, was the twelfth driver to take to the track. Surprisingly, he was only a fraction quicker than Siegel. Newgarden was not happy with his run and immediately complained over the radio that he was hitting the rev limiter too often.

The next strong challenge came from David Malukas, who – just as he had a week earlier – was significantly faster than Newgarden. Scott McLaughlin followed right after but failed to beat him and even ended up slower than Newgarden.

Other drivers such as Will Power, Felix Rosenqvist, Colton Herta, and Kyle Kirkwood also couldn’t get close to Malukas’ time. Could he finally take pole after narrowly missing out in the previous race? At that point, only Christian Lundgaard, Scott Dixon, Pato O’Ward, and Alex Palou were left to run.

Lundgaard delivered a strong qualifying run but fell short by five hundredths of a second over two laps compared to Malukas. Still, it showed the potential of McLaren, which had already been quickest in practice with O’Ward. Dixon also missed out, leaving the two main pole favorites to hit the track: O’Ward and Palou.

O’Ward opened his run with a blistering first lap, half a mile per hour faster than Malukas. He then backed it up with another strong effort, becoming the only driver to complete both laps with an average speed over 202 mph.

Could it be beaten? The driver who had dominated the field all season was still to come: Alex Palou. But the newly crowned champion couldn’t match O’Ward’s pace and ended up only fourth fastest, handing O’Ward the final pole position of the season.

Full results of the 1st qualifying session on Nashville Superspeedway