Bad weather forced the qualifying session for the second race of IndyCar’s Houston double-header to be abandoned.

Heavy rain fell immediately before the session was scheduled to start on Sunday morning. Series officials carried out several track inspections as the rain eased off, but the large amounts of standing water around the circuit finally forced the session to be called off.

Consequently, the grid for Sunday’s race will be determined by entrant points, meaning that Saturday race winner Scott Dixon will start from pole position for Target Chip Ganassi Racing, although he will not earn the usual bonus point.

“I think we probably would have liked to qualify,” he said. “It seems like Helio [Castroneves] is struggling a little bit more this weekend, so if we could have had that bit of separation on the grid like yesterday, it would have been nice.

“I think if we were at a typical road course it wouldn’t have been as much of an issue with this amount of rain, but as everyone knows, street courses tend to puddle a lot. Hopefully it clears and makes for a good day’s racing. It’s a lot cooler [than yesterday], and I’m not sure the start will be completely dry, but it should be pretty close, hopefully.”

The Brazilian will start alongside his title rival on the front row.

The weather conditions are forecast to improve in time for this afternoon’s race.

Pos  Driver               Team/Engine 1.  Scott Dixon          Ganassi/Honda 2.  Helio Castroneves    Penske/Chevy 3.  Simon Pagenaud       Schmidt/Honda 4.  Marco Andretti       Andretti/Chevy 5.  Ryan Hunter-Reay     Andretti/Chevy 6.  Justin Wilson        Coyne/Honda 7.  Dario Franchitti     Ganassi/Honda 8.  Will Power           Penske/Chevy 9.  James Hinchcliffe    Andretti/Chevy10.  Charlie Kimball      Ganassi/Honda11.  Tony Kanaan          KV/Chevy12.  EJ Viso              Andretti/Chevy13.  Sebastien Bourdais   Dragon/Chevy14.  Josef Newgarden      Fisher/Honda15.  Simona de Silvestro  KV/Chevy16.  Takuma Sato          Foyt/Honda17.  Mike Conway          Coyne/Honda18.  Graham Rahal         Rahal/Honda19.  Ed Carpenter         Carpenter/Chevy20.  James Jakes          Rahal/Honda21.  Oriol Servia         Panther/Chevy22.  Tristan Vautier      Schmidt/Honda23.  Luca Filippi         Barracuda/Honda24.  Sebastian Saavedra   Dragon/Chevy