Kirkwood stunned after momentary lapse costs him Fast Six chance

Andretti Global’s Kyle Kirkwood was ominously fast in the final practice session leading into qualifying and was expected to vie for pole position at the Java House Grand Prix of Arlington. But the Floridian, who owns four street course wins since 2023, made a costly mistake that took the No. 27 Honda out of contention for pole and was duly knocked out of the closing Firestone Fast Six session by teammate Marcus Ericsson who went on to earn pole.

“We had a little hiccup on pit lane,” said Kirkwood, who will start seventh. “I just forgot which lap we needed to do our lap on. And for some reason I had embedded in my mind, ‘It's lap 2, it's lap 2,’ but we had three laps of fuel in the car, and I had a big mistake down in Turn 10, and still pitted. For some reason it was just a bit of a messy run, no doubt. But man, I'm very disappointed. That one's on me.”

Despite being visibly downtrodden, Kirkwood expects to shake off the error and move forward in the race.

“I'd have to say our prime tire pace is incredible, which is a very good sign for tomorrow's race,” he said. “If I had new primes right now in qualifying, I probably would have used those. But it's very unfortunate, because I thought this was going to be…it's never easy getting a pole and qualifying in any car racing, but I thought this was going to be one of the easier ones. And quite honestly, I just made a massive mental error.”