This Saturday marks the 50th Anniversary of the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach in IndyCar, and Kyle Kirkwood showed consistent pace today during qualifying and received pole position as a reward for his efforts.
The driver of the No. 27 PreFab Honda for Andretti won his third career NTT P1 award earlier this afternoon. This is his second NTT P1 award at Long Beach with his first in 2023 resulting in a first place finish on Sunday.
Andretti’s Strength Displayed
All three Andrettis stayed in the top 10 during all groups and rounds of qualifying today – showing that the Long Beach street course is where they are strong.
Kirkwood observed that Andretti does street courses well. They had a 1-2 here in 2023, and Colton Herta was in contention for the victory last season.
“No shocker, right? Andretti has been really good here in recent years. Even more so this year. We rolled off the end of season last year really, really strong at street courses.
“Yeah we’ve really strong, especially these more bumpy, less grip street courses, and proved it here once again here today.”
Kirkwood ended round 1 with the fastest lap time which put him at the top of group 2. Round 2 was no different with the driver staying at the top.
Qualifying ended with an Andretti qualifying 1-2 with teammate Colton Herta finishing second.
Long Beach Favors
Kyle Kirkwood saw success at Long Beach two years ago in 2023 and no doubt will be trying to mirror his previous success in the present. This street course is an enjoyable one to drive with unique characteristics.
“What I like most about it is I’ve done pretty decent here, if I’m being honest. Street courses for some reason suit me. They also suit Andretti and our philosophy on how to develop a car.
“So you tend to like the tracks that you do best at, and this is one of them. This is just an enjoyable track to drive. It’s not, like, a typical street circuit where it’s just 90-degree corners. There’s a lot more character to it than just that and some pretty massive brake zones and disparities from high and low speed corners.
“It tends to be pretty enjoyable to drive just as a driver.”
Like all other races, tire strategy plays a big part in success. The Andretti driver mentioned they have not done much with the alternates. It will be important to run both the alternates and primaries in warm-up to see how they run.
”We really haven’t done enough lap on the alternates to know, but if St. Pete is any indicator, yes, you’re not going to want to run very long on the alternates, which is why you see most of the guys just use them all up right away. Even in Q1 you saw a lot of guys double down or use used on the second [quali].
“Yeah, to some extent, yes, but we also need to get laps on them and know where they actually stack up.”
Will History Repeat Itself?
Having won from pole in Long Beach before, Kyle Kirkwood has shown that it can be done.
“I mean, it definitely helps, right? It helps even more given that you have teammates around you as well. Yeah, it is very important.
“I know when we raced here in ’23, we did not lead the whole race. We had to do a little bit of strategy.”
Looking ahead to tomorrow’s race, the driver of the No. 27 PreFab Honda understands the importance of controlling strategy.
“Strategy will come into play a little bit to how it dictates the race, but it definitely helps to be able to kind of control that strategy and kick it out from the lead.
“So see to you it goes. Hopefully I maintain the lead in the first stint and from there it’s clean sailing, but that’s not how INDYCAR racing typically goes.”
A win on Sunday would be incredible for Kirkwood and the No. 27 car on the 50th Anniversary of the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach.
It Can Be a Guessing Game
Weather and track temps can vary over the course of a race weekend. It really is up to the team to factor this in and be on top of strategy. This weekend was no different as Kirkwood mentioned all the variables.
The car may look and feel good for one session will feel different when track temp and weather changes
“I don’t think anyone really knows because yesterday track was green, a little bit warm, sun was out. Then this morning it’s just been super cool, overcast, marine fog, and completely flip-flopped from yesterday. It will probably flip-flop again tomorrow.
“We probably won’t learn anything in the morning, if I’m being honest. It’s going to be guessing, and [I] couldn’t ask for a better team to guess with.”
Sunday’s race day looks to be quite promising for Kirkwood and Andretti Global – the pressure is on for them to deliver and stay consistent. Tomorrow might be the day for another full sweep by Kyle Kirkwood.
