Scott Dixon will head an all-Ganassi front row for the second race of this weekend’s IZOD IndyCar Series double-header at Toronto.
The New Zealander led his group for most of the session, and became the only driver so far this weekend to dip below the 59s mark with his 58.9686sec effort, which came just as James Jakes crashed and brought out the red flags.
“The lap just came together; I left a little on the table yesterday,” said Dixon. “The guys put in some work on the car last night, making a few adjustments, and it’s definitely got the speed to drive today.
“It’s been a little while since we’ve been on pole for a road/street course, so definitely very happy about.”
Dario Franchitti, who will start today’s first race from pole, topped the first qualifying group with his 59.1905sec and will line up alongside his teammate on Sunday.
“The more people run, the more rubber goes down, so we were expecting the second session to be quicker,” Franchitti said. “We’re very happy to have both Target cars on the front row and Scott did a great job to get the pole.”
Helio Castroneves and Ryan Hunter-Reay will share the second row ahead of Will Power and E.J. Viso.
Both Power and Sebastien Bourdais, who will start from the fourth row, could potentially have finished higher up, but Power glanced the barriers late in the second session and dragged an advertising banner off the wall. He managed to shed it from his car, only for it to wrap itself around Bourdais’ front wing instead. Jakes’s crash a moment later denied the Dragon team an opportunity to try and remove it.
Pos Driver Team/Engine Time Gap 1. Scott Dixon Ganassi/Honda 58.9686s 2. Dario Franchitti Ganassi/Honda 59.1905s +0.222s 3. Helio Castroneves Penske/Chevy 59.1953s +0.226s 4. Ryan Hunter-Reay Andretti/Chevy 59.3915s +0.423s 5. Will Power Penske/Chevy 59.2503s +0.281s 6. Tony Kanaan KV/Chevy 59.5360s +0.567s 7. Sebastien Bourdais Dragon/Chevy 59.5421s Group 2 8. Ryan Briscoe Panther/Chevy 59.5473s Group 1 9. Alex Tagliani Herta/Honda 59.7601s Group 210. Simona de Silvestro KV/Chevy 59.6489s Group 111. EJ Viso Andretti/Chevy 59.7821s Group 212. James Hinchcliffe Andretti/Chevy 59.6750s Group 113. Simon Pagenaud Schmidt/Honda 59.8326s Group 214. Justin Wilson Coyne/Honda 59.7113s Group 115. Takuma Sato Foyt/Honda 1m00.0874s Group 216. Charlie Kimball Ganassi/Honda 59.7871s Group 117. Tristan Vautier Schmidt/Honda 1m00.3204s Group 218. Marco Andretti Andretti/Chevy 59.8207s Group 119. Josef Newgarden Fisher/Honda 1m00.6174s Group 220. Graham Rahal Rahal/Honda 59.9216s Group 121. James Jakes Rahal/Honda 1m00.7204s Group 222. Sebastian Saavedra Dragon/Chevy 1m00.1913s Group 123. Ed Carpenter Carpenter/Chevy 1m00.9519s Group 224. Mike Conway Coyne/Honda 1m00.3919s Group 1
Comments