Ron McQueeney/IMS
Peak Performance Pole Qualifying Notes:
·This is Dario Franchitti’s second PEAK Performance Pole Award of 2009 and the eighth of his IndyCar Series career. His last pole came at Texas
·This is Franchitti’s second pole start at Richmond International Raceway. He also started on the pole here in his last IndyCar Series appearance in 2007, when he led 242 laps and won the race.
· Scott Dixon qualified a season-best second. His previous best was third at Texas.
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·Ryan Briscoe qualified fourth, ending his streak of four consecutive front row starts.
·Raphael Matos qualified sixth, his career-best performance on an oval.
·E.J. Viso qualified seventh, his career-best performance on an oval.
Peak Performance Pole Qualifying Quotes:
DARIO FRANCHITTI (No. 10 Target Chip Ganassi Racing, PEAK Performance Pole Award winner): “I enjoy the short tracks. We started on pole here in ‘07, but that was based on points. I actually had to earn it today. The Target car was fast. Dixie (Scott Dixon) and I are both starting up front, so it’s a good day for Team Target. I enjoy the technique of racing on short ovals, the way you have to set the car up. Things come at you quick here. It’s a really fun discipline of our series and I really enjoy it.”
SCOTT DIXON (No. 9 Target Chip Ganassi Racing, qualified second): “After some changes in practice, for a couple of laps we were just trying to feel the car out. The car was really good and should have been closer to pole if not on pole and I kind of let that down. We have a good car for the race and fantastic with two cars on the front row and hopefully we can keep it that way at the end.”
HELIO CASTRONEVES (No. 3 Team Penske, qualified third): “The No. 3 Team Penske car was pretty good in practice this morning, especially in Turns 1&2, but unfortunately on my third qualifying lap, I had a huge moment. I’ll tell you, it may not look that bad on TV, but when you’re in the car it’s pretty intense. This place is so fast, I didn’t have enough time to fix or readjust the car. I am not sure how I was able to hold it together, and I was just trying to finish the run safely, so I definitely lost some speed. Thankfully, I was able to save it and Team Penske ended up in a decent starting spot (third) for tomorrow’s race.”
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RYAN BRISCOE (No. 6 Team Penske, qualified fourth): “I was really happy with my qualifying run today. We weren’t too confident with the car in practice, but I was pleasantly surprised with the progress we made. I have to say, my engineers did a great job, and I think we really improved the Team Penske car a lot between practice and qualifying. It doesn’t really matter where you start here as long as you’re in the top six or eight. So, I think we should be in fine shape for tomorrow. It’s a big race for us, Richmond is home to our partner Philip Morris, so we always aim to do well.”
GRAHAM RAHAL (No. 02 McDonald’s Racing Team, qualified fifth): “The McDonald’s boys were working extremely hard today because we certainly weren’t on pace earlier today. We still have a little bit too much understeer we’ve got to work on but we made big gains from earlier today and we’re closer to the pace of some of these guys so we’ve got to be pretty happy.”
