Malukas Misses Qualifying Following Practice Crash
One driver who did not take part in qualifying was David Malukas. The American suffered a heavy crash in Turn 2 during the practice session and was transported to the hospital for further evaluation. Conor Daly was subsequently brought in as a replacement for at least qualifying, but the team did not have enough time to rebuild the #12 car.Rasmussen First Driver into the 195 mph Range
Among the first drivers to complete their qualifying runs, Christian Rasmussen moved to the top of the speed charts before teammate Alexander Rossi took over with a two-lap average speed of 195.664 mph.Scott Dixon went a fraction of a second quicker before Scott McLaughlin became the first driver to average more than 196 mph. There was even more speed to come, as Team Penske's Josef Newgarden was another half mile per hour quicker shortly afterward.
American Front Row in Nashville
Would Josef Newgarden be able to start his home race from pole position? It appeared that way for quite some time, until Kyle Kirkwood took to the track as the penultimate driver and opened his run with a lap above 197 mph. The Andretti Global driver then lost a full mile per hour on his second lap, but it was still enough to knock Newgarden off provisional pole.There was only one driver left to make his qualifying run: Alex Palou. The Chip Ganassi Racing driver delivered a much more consistent two-lap average, but could not match Kirkwood's pace and qualified fourth. That secured Kirkwood his second career pole position at Nashville Superspeedway.
Qualifying was completed without any major incidents, although Graham Rahal suffered technical issues and, like Malukas, was unable to complete a qualifying run.
Full results of the qualifying session at Nashville Superspeedway
PhotographyPenske Entertainment
