Scott McLaughlin makes his feelings clear as Will Power claims milestone feat for Team Penske
Team Penske driver Scott McLaughlin recently spoke about his feelings after teammate Will Power secured pole position at the Bommarito Automotive Group 500 on June 14. McLaughlin qualified in second place for the race.
The New Zealander drives the #3 Team Penske car powered by Chevrolet. His teammate Will Power claimed his first pole position since July 2023 at an average speed of 180.329mph. This marked Team Penske's 700th pole position across all the racing series the team has participated in over its 50-year history.
During the post-qualifying press conference, Scott McLaughlin was questioned about the huge milestone. He replied by saying,
"Yeah, I forgot about that. That's a big one. I would have loved to have got that. Anyway, look, it's huge to have that with the 700th, then to have a front-row lockout, obviously that's a big thing. Really happy for the team. Really happy for RP, who is currently locked in on the Le Mans 24 Hours as we speak. All good."
With this pole position, Team Penske claimed their second pole position for the 2025 season and procured their first front-row lockout. The first pole position for this season was claimed by Scott McLaughlin at the maiden race of the season, following which he finished the race in fourth place.
As for the three-time Supercar champion's 2025 season, it is off to a strong start as he qualified in 6th place at the 50th anniversary ACURA Grand Prix of Long Beach held on 13th April. He finished the race in the same place. At the Sonsio Grand Prix held on May 10th, he qualified in 4th place and finished the race in the same place once again.
At the recently held Detroit Grand Prix, he qualified in 7th position and finished the race in 12th place after he was handed a drive-through penalty for a crash with Nolan Siegel. Team Penske and the car #3 driver will be looking forward to keeping up the positive results during the upcoming race.
Scott McLaughlin opens up about attempting Double Duty
Scott McLaughlin recently opened up about attempting the Double in the future, like the NASCAR driver Kyle Larson. However, the 32-year-old made it clear that he intends to focus on IndyCar. He also emphasized how his main priority was to win the Indianapolis 500.
"I would do it, but I think I've got a few boxes I want to tick here in IndyCar first. I know it's a boring answer but it's definitely something I'm really interested in doing, but I think I owe it to RP (Roger Penske) and the team to focus on what I'm doing here in IndyCar and then the rest will follow." (7:42 onwards)
"If you look at [Kyle] Larson; like he was burnt out from doing it the last couple of years and I need to make sure that I've won this big race and ultimately the one that I want to win the most, before I even think about moving on to something else and doing something crazy like that," McLaughlin added.
During his recent outing at the Indianapolis 500, Scott McLaughlin could not complete the event, as he ended up crashing out during his warm-up lap.