Kanaan surprised to be on the Kansas Pole

Tony Kanaan scored his seventh IndyCar Series pole by circling the 1.5mile Kansas Speedway in 25.5467 seconds (214.188miles per hour). By grabbing his first pole since the Indy 500 in 2005, Kanaan's green Andretti Green racing machine broke a 15 race streak of pole positions earned by the red cars of Penske Racing and Ganassi Racing.

“Did we expect to be on the pole here? - No!,” said a quietly smiling Kanaan, who has watched Penske and Ganassi dominate the big tracks since the start of the 2006 season. “Did I expect to be better this weekend? - Yes!”

Kanaan said it would take him all day to detail all the changes his team has made in trying to find more overall speed on the faster tracks, but “we have looked at everything on the car. Gone to the wind tunnel, changed the suspension.” He also joked that if he told reporters the real secrets, “I would have to kill you!”

Penske Racing's Sam Hornish, Jr., was second quickest, with teammate Helio Castroneves in third.

“We hit the rev limiter a little bit going in to the third turn,” said Hornish. “I had a choice between fifth and sixth and chose fifth - which was the better option, but hitting the limiter may have cost us the pole.”

Rounding out the top five were Ganassi Racing's Dan Wheldon and Scott Dixon.

“I think we were are going to have to go do some work to make sure we're fast enough in the race,” said Wheldon who lead the first practice of the day. “I think we are a little bit better than what we were in qualifying. We definitely have the ability to be very quick, but I don't think we have it right just yet.”

Dario Franchitti was able to qualify sixth after fighting electrical problems in the second practice session. Kanaan believes it will be important 'to have my wingman' up there during the race, and said that because he and Franchitti had split setups 'to my benefit' that once they put the same stuff on both cars, Franchitti would 'have a very good car.'

Turning in another solid qualifying performance was Tomas Scheckter who will start seventh, just to the inside of Vitor Meira.

“We did the best we could,” said Scheckter of his improving Vision racing team. “It was a little bit off our quickest, but we put a good car together.”

Turning in disappointing performances were the AGR cars of Marco Andretti (9th) and Danica Patrick (10th). Danica in particular thought she would do better after practicing in the top five of both earlier sessions.

Just behind Danica and Andretti is the car of Darren Manning. While 10th is bad for Danica and an AGR car, 11th is pretty good for the AJ Foyt Racing car being driven by Manning.

The Foyt team has struggled to even crack the top 15 during qualifying on other superspeedway's over the past couple years, so this minor improvement is a big step forward for the legendary Foyt team.

“The car is comfortable and I am confident,” said Manning. “You never can tell what you have relative to everyone else until qualifying - that's the true test of speed. We've got a good baseline set-up, and now we can massage on it and fine tune it for that extra tenth or two. Now we can start taking advantage of some of the things we've learned in the wind tunnel test we've had. We are a work in progress.”

To the surprise of no one, Milka Duno qualified 21st (last), though she has been consistent and solid all weekend. Rooftop spotters for other teams reported she 'has a good line,' which is likely helped by her work with former driver Pancho Carter. Carter has previously spotted for Sam Hornish, Jr., and Dan Wheldon, among others, in recent years.

“It was a successful day,” said Duno. “Though we know we don't have the speed. We kept learning in practice and we'll learn more in the race. It was a little frustrating because I was right there at the top of what the car could do in it's present setup. But, we're missing a few aerodynamic updates on the car...that will ultimately reduce some drag and make the car more slippery.”

With final warm-ups eliminated from the oval tracks for 2007, the next on track activity will be the Kansas Lottery Indy 300 on Sunday at 3:00PM (Central US Time).

Qualifying times from Kansas
1 Tony Kanaan (11) ... 25.5476 214.188
2 Sam Hornish Jr (6) 0.0234 25.5710 213.992
3 Helio Castroneves (3) 0.0444 25.5920 213.817
4 Dan Wheldon (10) 0.0450 25.5926 213.812
5 Scott Dixon (9) 0.0473 25.5949 213.793
6 Dario Franchitti (27) 0.1335 25.6811 213.075
7 Tomas Scheckter (2) 0.2597 25.8073 212.033
8 Vitor Meira (4) 0.2839 25.8315 211.834
9 Marco Andretti (26) 0.2871 25.8347 211.808
10 Danica Patrick (7) 0.2886 25.8362 211.796
11 Darren Manning (14) 0.3037 25.8513 211.672
12 Kosuke Matsuura (55) 0.3245 25.8721 211.502
13 Ed Carpenter (20) 0.3306 25.8782 211.452
14 Scott Sharp (8) 0.3340 25.8816 211.424
15 AJ Foyt IV (22) 0.3612 25.9088 211.202
16 Jeff Simmons (17) 0.3868 25.9344 210.994
17 Sarah Fisher (5) 0.4413 25.9889 210.551
18 Buddy Rice (15) 0.4445 25.9921 210.526
19 Marty Roth (25) 0.5736 26.1212 209.485
20 Alex Barron (98) 0.6270 26.1746 209.058
21 Milka Duno (23) 0.7278 26.2754 208.256.

ORS / CAPSIS International