Penske IndyCar drivers frustrated after poor Mid-Ohio qualifying

Will Power, Scott McLaughlin, and Josef Newgarden all showed their frustrations after being eliminated early from IndyCar Indy 200 Mid-Ohio qualifying as the team’s problems continue this season.

Despite McLaughlin belief that the car felt good, the Kiwi failed to make it past Q1 Group One and will start 21st for tomorrow's race.

Informed by the team that he “just missed” on proceeding to Round Two on his lap, McLaughlin replied to the team: “Man, the car is so good. Why the f***.”

McLaughlin’s race strategist, Ben Bretzman, tried to calm the driver down telling him that it was a “super, super tight” group but this didn’t seem to quell his frustrations. 

Once stopped in his box, McLaughlin could be heard swearing multiple times and asking: “What gap was that? F*** me.”

Once out of the car, McLaughlin spoke to FS1 and said: “I just get held up or you just get into a bad spot. You have to back off, you can’t use your tire at the right spot so really bummed for the Odyssey Battery Team.

“I genuinely feel like it should have been easy to transfer there so, yea, it’s pretty bad.”

Two-time world champions Will Power and Josef Newgarden were put together in Group Two and both were also eliminated at the earliest possible point in the qualifying session.

While Newgarden will start a dreary 18th, Power qualified even further behind in 21st after what has already been a difficult weekend for the Aussie.

Newgarden finished P9 in Q1 Group Two and was told by his strategist, Luke Mason, on his in-lap that he “needed two hundredths to transfer.”

A silence followed from Newgarden before he replied: “[I] got a little f***** by this guy in front. There is f****** dirt everywhere, [I] went through a f****** cloud in Turn one.”

The American driver was joined by several drivers in sharing frustration towards traffic all weekend with Power earlier in the weekend confronting Alex Palou on the matter after Practice Two.

Power swore multiple times at the current championship leader after he believed he had been blocked throughout the session by the Spaniard.

After his elimination, Power spoke to the team first. Clearly frustrated, he said: “Let me guess, half a tenth we missed?”

Power’s strategist responded in a downbeat tone: “yeah, maybe less than that.”

The Australian driver shared after his confrontation with Palou that he was annoyed because it was stopping him and the team from “trying to get an idea of what our car is doing”.

Whether this had a direct impact on Power’s overall position in qualifying is unclear but while Power starts 21st, Palou will start on pole.

Setting a blistering lap time, Palou was two-tenths faster than the nearest car of Christian Lundgaard in his Arrow McLaren and over seven-tenths faster than Kyffin Simpson in third.

After the session, Palou said: “Ever since I started with Chip Ganassi Racing, we've had great cars but I would say we've always struggled qualifying up front, so this year it's been phenomenal.

“The speed we have in the cars, in every single race track we show up, it's been amazing.”

Penske has struggled all season with qualifying pace and so far has had one of its toughest seasons for a long time.

Both Josef Newgarden and Will Power were disqualified from the Indy 500 qualifying after their cars were found with illegally modified rear attenuators which is a spec safety part.

In response to the scandal, the team fired several key figures including Team President, Tim Cindric, Managing Director, Ron Ruzewski, and General Manager, Kyle Moyer.

Ahead of this weekend, the team announced it had found a replacement for Cindric with Jonathan Diuguid taking over as Team President.

Diuguid previously led Porsche Penske Motorsport to both the 2024 and 2025 24 Hours of Daytona victories.

Diuguid was joined by Travis Law in his promotion with Law named the Competition Director for the team.