Collet earns maiden Indy Nxt pole with Mid-Ohio track record

Photo: Chris Owens

Caio Collet set a new track record at the repaved Mid-Ohio track as he took his first pole position in Indy Nxt.

The HMD Motorsports driver set a 1m10.2879s in the second qualifying group to knock Louis Foster off pole position after Andretti Global’s points leader had topped the first group.

Jacob Abel, who was just a tenth of a second slower than Collet, will line up third for Sunday’s race.

Foster immediately set the pace in group one ahead of Josh Pierson. He continued to slowly improve his laptimes, eventually beating Oliver Askew’s long-standing track record.

He ended qualifying with a personal best of 1m10.3072, which put him three tenths of a second ahead of HMD’s Callum Hedge who had jumped up to second place late on.

Group two was able to get onto the pace faster, with Abel and Collet quickly dropping into the 1m10s. It was late in the session when the latter dipped bettered Foster’s benchmark to claim pole.

Abel was second quickest in the group ahead of HMD’s Reece Gold. Early on, the group two drivers got bunched together while Gold managed to find space to run in clean air. It worked to his advantage as he was third fastest, placing him fifth on the grid. He will line up alongside Christian Brooks, who is contesting his second Indy Nxt event with HMD.

Jonathan Browne and Nolan Allaer were fourth quickest in their respective groups to make up the fourth row of the grid, ahead of Myles Rowe (whose car had to be repaired after practice) and Pierson.

Qualifying results