Dario Franchitti made an impressive comeback on his final qualifying lap to capture the pole for the Sonoma Grand Prix.
Franchitti turned in a lap of 76.7987 seconds on the tough 12-turn, 2.303-mile road course Saturday at Infineon Raceway, narrowly beating out Ryan Briscoe for his fourth pole of the season. The Associated Press
Franchitti is the only driver to participate in the seven Firestone Fast Six sessions this season. That’s no easy feat.
“It’s so hard in the IndyCar Series with the competition level; there are so many good road racers,” said Franchitti, who started from the pole in 2007 and has finished second and third in his past two races at the Sonoma Valley facility. “To make it into the Fast Six each time is an achievement every time. So to be in them all, I’ve got to thank my guys for giving me good cars.
“Sometimes you have to hang on to it as well and sometimes you have to wheel around. Today I had a pretty good car. In a couple corners I had to commit to them and hang on, but in general the car was really good. I’m very happy to get the Target car on the pole for the race.”
Franchitti brings three victories and nine top-five finishes into the fray at Infineon, where he earned the pole in 2007 and has finished second and third in his past two races. Dixon won that ‘07 race and started from the pole in ‘06, while Briscoe followed Helio Castroneves across the finish line last year in second and won the pole in the inaugural event in 2005. IndyCar
Briscoe finished .05 seconds behind Franchitti to take the outside pole.
IndyCar Series: Indy Grand Prix of Sonoma - Race Line-Up
“I’m a little bit frustrated,” said Briscoe, who also started second in last year’s race at Sonoma. “There was a couple of times when I was quicker, but I was having a few braking issues here today. I was struggling a little bit to get some consistency.”
Castroneves, who started on the pole and won at Sonoma last year, qualified third, while Marco Andretti and Hideki Mutoh, both from Andretti Green Racing, rounded out the top-five.
Graham Rahal qualified sixth, followed by Tony Kanaan, newcomer Franck Montagny and Mike Conway. Scott Dixon, the current points leader, was a surprising 10th after struggling throughout qualifying. MiamiHerald.com
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