Foster and Rahal Qualified 11th and 12th for the Detroit Grand Prix; Schumacher to Start 23rd After Contact in Qualifying

Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing

Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix – Streets of Downtown Detroit

NTT INDYCAR SERIES

QUALIFYING NOTES / QUOTES – May 30, 2026

FOSTER AND RAHAL QUALIFIED 11TH AND 12TH FOR THE CHEVROLET DETROIT GRAND PRIX; SCHUMACHER TO START 23RD AFTER LOSING HIS TWO FASTEST LAPS IN QUALIFYING DUE TO BRINGING OUT THE RED FLAG WHEN HE MADE CONTACT

1) Alex Palou 1:01.9017 / 95.668 mph (Group 2, Round 3)

11) Louis Foster 1:01.8340 / 95.773 mph (Group 1, Round 2)

12) Graham Rahal 1:01.9830 / 95.542 mph (Group 2, Round 2)

23) Mick Schumacher 1:07.4493 / 87.799 mph (Group 1, Round 1)

GRAHAM RAHAL, No. 15 Fifth Third Bank Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “This was the same thing I’ve been fighting all weekend. The car is so inconsistent to drive, that one lap, you feel okay, the next lap it doesn’t. Which inherently is part of this place, but man, it was hard in qualifying. I couldn’t really put it fully together. I probably should have continued on, on one lap, and I lifted. I was only a tenth down on my best and I lifted to try to put together the last lap and I went into the last lap and the tires were overboard. Unfortunately, it is what it is. We’ve got to say clear the carnage on lap one. And we’re going to need to have good race pace and create our own strategy. I think that’s the biggest thing here. The tires seem to actually have pretty good life, but everybody is sliding around a lot so we’ve just got to be smart here.”

FAST FACTS: The event will mark Rahal’s 22nd race in Detroit. His father, Bobby, won the inaugural race on Belle Isle in 1992 and Graham won the doubleheader there in 2017. In 2025, he qualified fifth but had to serve a six-grid penalty and started 11th. He moved up to third place by Lap 13 as different pit strategies came into play. A caution came out from Laps 14-16 and he moved into second place on Lap 15 and held the position for 17 laps before he made his first stop on Lap 32. Once he got back on track, he radioed the crew to ask if there was an issue with his right rear tie and was called back into the pits. A nut had not tightened on his previous stop and was jammed, which took time to remove before he could take on a new one and dropped him laps down before he returned on the track. He ultimately finished 20th. Highlights in Detroit include two fifth place finishes in the doubleheader in 2021 and in 2019, he earned two seventh place finishes. Rahal’s more successful INDYCAR race weekend came in Detroit in 2017. In Dual 1 in 2017, Rahal earned his first pole since Kansas 2009 and led a dominating 55 of 70 laps en route to his fifth series victory and first ever from pole. He handily held the lead with the exception of pit cycles and built a gap of more than 13 seconds at one point before he ultimately won by a six-second margin over Scott Dixon. For Dual 2, Rahal set the second fastest time in his qualifying Group 2 to Sato to start third. In the race, he passed Hunter-Reay on Lap 8 and closed the gap to pole sitter and leader Sato but could not pass. Sato pit one lap earlier than Rahal, who took the lead on Lap 23 before he made his first of two stops on Lap 24 and returned to the track behind Newgarden who was on a three-stop strategy. Oce newgarden pit on Lap 29, Rahal took over the lead and steadily built his gap to second place to 16 seconds over Sato before his second and final stop on Lap 47. He then proceeded to build an 18 second gap over second place before he caught traffic. That reduced his lead to new second place runner Newgarden to 5.5 seconds before a red flag came out for the car of Pigot, who experiences a smoky end. All race cars were stopped in pit lane for approximately 10 minutes while the track was cleared and an attempt to remove marbles was made. The race resumed with a two-lap shootout and Rahal utilized his 57 seconds of Push to Pass over Newgarden’s 36 to keep the lead on the restart before he was able to pull a slight gap before the checkered flag to become the first winner of both races in Detroit. In total, he led 41 of 70 laps. His other podiums in the race came in 2014 with second place in Dual 1 and third place in Dual 2 in 2015. Overall, he has two wins, four podiums and one pole in 21 races here. Has SIX IndyCar Series wins (2008 – St. Pete street course; 2015 – Fontana Super Speedway, Mid-Ohio road course; 2016 – Texas Super Speedway; 2017 Detroit Race 1, Detroit Race 2) and FIVE poles (2009 – St. Pete street course, Kansas oval; 2017 – Detroit Race 1 street; 2023 Indy road course, Portland road course) and his highest series season-ending standing is fourth place in 2015… He is ranked 11th in series standings with 151 points.

LOUIS FOSTER, No. 45 Droplight Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “I was optimistic and we tried to advance to the top six but I didn’t think we had the car to do that. We kind of maximized what we had there today, honestly. I’m glad that we transferred to Round 2. But I think there is still some work to do on the car and try to understand why we’ve lost a bit of time to last year, because we had a bit more pace last year and this year is a bit of a struggle, especially for Graham. I think generally the car feels okay there is just a lack of grip and we need to figure out how to bridge that deficit to the top teams. Whilst we can be happy-ish about transferring, we still want to be up front.”

FAST FACTS: Will be his second INDYCAR race here. His INDYCAR debut in Detroit didn’t go as planned. He qualified 14th and started 13th due to grid penalties. He moved up to fifth by Lap 13 in the race as different pit strategies played out. A caution came out from Laps 14-16 and he moved into fourth on Lap 16. He took over third on Lap 19 and held it until Lap 32 when second place runner Rahal pit and he took over second. He made his first stop on Lap 37 and set his fastest lap of the race on Lap 41/100 while seventh. After his final stop, he ran 15th when a car part failed and he hit the wall going into Turn 3. He was taken to INDYCAR Medical and was seen and released as was Felix Rosenqvist who was hit by Foster. He was ultimately scored in 22nd place. On Saturday, he was a mere -0.008 of a second from transferring to Round 2, with a seventh-place rank in Round 1, Group 2 and qualified 14th. Louis has competed in three INDY NXT races on the downtown streets of Detroit and started from pole in all three. In 2024, he won the race from pole. And in Race 1 of a doubleheader weekend in Detroit in 2023, he started from pole but contact limited his finish to 19th.. In Race 2, he finished third after starting from pole. He is hoping to have another chance to run in the top-five of the race in Detroit… He is 19th in the series point standings with 95.

MICK SCHUMACHER, No. 47 ENVE Dallara/Honda/Firestone: “I clipped the wall in Turn 6 and that pushed me wide into Turn 7 and then I clipped the wall there and that ultimately then put me off into the wall on the exit of seven, unfortunately, because that lap didn’t seem too bad. We were on the back foot all day yesterday, all day today. This track is obviously very different to anything that I’ve driven so far just in terms of how different the grip is corner to corner but also, it’s a high commitment track for sure. Definitely this morning it was really weird how the tire behaved. People were doing 12 lap runs and the best lap was the last one. That was kind of the target for us as well, to run as much as possible. Unfortunately, that didn’t quite work out. I’m sorry to the team about that; its never a great thing, and unfortunately, this time we have a little bit more to do to repair everything for tomorrow. On that lap, I was around five tenths faster. The car felt pretty good. I just tried a bit too much and unfortunately didn’t put the lap together then after that. So, I think the car was all right. It would have not been, you know, right up there. I doubt it. I mean, I haven’t seen what the other guys did at the end there, but, for me and for what I felt like this morning, it was an improvement. These (street courses) are all tracks that I see for the first time. I haven’t even done this track on the simulator. I think that that probably plays a lot in qualifying In Long Beach, we didn’t do FP1 and still had a good qualifying. It’s a very different series, and definitely a very different car to drive to me and I’m trying to find my ground here and learn as we go.”

FAST FACTS: Schumacher clipped the wall in Turn 6 heading into Turn 7 and did not progress out of Round 1, Group 1. He had set the 11th fastest time but his two fastest laps were taken away due to bringing out the red flag and he will start 23rd This marks Mick’s fourth street race of the season and eighth series event. His best street course start this season is 17th in Arlington and his best street course finish is 17th in Long Beach. After being named the Fastest Rookie after Indy 500 qualifying and the Indy 500 Rookie of the Year, he is ready to return to turning left and right on course. He is third in the Rookie of the Year standings with 66 points and has an overall rank of 24th place.

RAHAL LETTERMAN LANIGAN RACING AT DETROIT: The 2026 event will mark the 26th year for Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing (RLL) to compete in Detroit after 22 years of competition at the Raceway at Belle Isle Park. It is the team’s 35th race here. The team’s highest start of pole came in 2017 with Graham Rahal earning his first pole since 2009 in Race 1. Bobby and Graham Rahal have earned a combined total of three wins for the team here. Bobby won the inaugural race on Belle Isle in 1992 and Graham is the only driver to have won both races on the same weekend, which he did in 2017. In total, the team has earned eight podiums (2nd – G. Rahal 2014, Jakes 2013 & Max Papis 2000), (3rd – G. Rahal 2015, Takuma Sato 2019) 12 top-five finishes and 24 top-10’s here (chart available).

NEXT UP: The Chevrolet Grand Prix of Detroit will be televised live on FOX beginning at 12:30 PM ET Sunday, May 31.