Why record-setting Felix Rosenqvist is ‘driving naturally’

The Swede’s pace throughout the weekend has been a force that was capped by a claiming the track record en route to a front row start for Sunday’s 100-lap race to kick off the 2024 IndyCar Series season.

During the Top 12 segment of qualifying, Rosenqvist dispatched a flying lap of 59.2706s around the 1.8-mile, 14-turn temporary street circuit that struck down the mark of 59.3466s set by Will Power in 2022, which also vaulted him into the Fast Six.

In the end, the pole eluded the 32-year-old by the narrowest of margins – 0.0058s, in fact, making it the closest front row in an IndyCar event on a street circuit since June 2012 (Belle Isle) when Scott Dixon edged Power by 0.0044s – as Team Penske’s Josef Newgarden made a late surge to claim the 17th of his respective career.

Still, though, the performance by Rosenqvist was sterling considering he is in the midst of his maiden race weekend with Meyer Shank Racing (MSR) after an offseason switch from Arrow McLaren.

“I feel like I’ve been driving very natural all weekend,” Rosenqvist said. “I haven’t thought too much about the way I put the car and brake and go in power. It’s kind of been coming naturally, and that’s I think when you perform the best.

“Lucky to be in that situation. My team has done a great job to kind of figure out what I like with the car, and obviously Andretti, us being a tight-knit group, that’s helped hugely as well. Yeah, amazing so far. Still 100 laps to go.”

Rosenqvist, who paced opening practice on Friday, not only delivered his best qualifying outing in St. Petersburg, but it marked the fourth time MSR earned a front row start (2020 – Indy GP, 2020 – Road America, 2021 – St. Pete).

“I think it’s a big boost for the whole team,” said Rosenqvist, a five-time pole-sitter in IndyCar. “I think when we came here this week and I could tell that people were hesitant to believe that we were as quick as we were in testing, but after P1 everyone is like a big relief. We’re in it. We’re good.

“Actually, honestly Mike (Shank, co-owner) and I have been talking, and we’ve been talking mostly about race craft because I think that’s probably more a personal thing with me. I’ve been generally strong in qualifying, but I think race craft is something that I want to improve.

“We’ve been focusing more on that. We thought that if we put everything together, we should be good in qualifying. Especially here. It’s a package that we know pretty well. I’m normally pretty good here.

“Yeah, just full focus on the race. I think warmup is going to be huge for us. Just kind of get that first long run under our belt and see how the car is on full tank and all that good stuff.

“Still early days. I think we celebrate a little bit. This result is a super cool day for us. We will recharge for tomorrow.”