Ryan Briscoe will have the best seat in the house when the green flag flies at the Glen. (LAT photo)
What Justin Wilson took away, Ryan Briscoe got back.
Briscoe recorded his fastest lap of the day on his final lap of the day, a 1-minute 29.3456-second flyer that bumped Wilson from P1 and put Briscoe on the pole for Sunday’s Camping World Indy Grand Prix at the Glen.
Wilson, whose team hadn’t been to Watkins Glen before this weekend and has yet to test its Dallaras on a road course, was atop the chart in Saturday’s final qualifying session with a lap of 1:29.3804 before Briscoe topped it in the No. 6 Team Penske Honda/Dallara.
“When I started that lap, I was about a tenth slower than I had been in the first sector,” Briscoe said. “They came on the radio and told me I’d dropped down to P2 and told me what Justin’s time was. I knew it was my last lap, so I just sucked it in and went for it.”
Briscoe said he backed off in certain sections in order to shave more time.
“I had to slow it down in order to go faster,” Briscoe said. “I had been overdriving it a bit and going a little wide around those fast bends. So I slowed it down a little bit and saw that my splits were better. It was so close. To come down to the last lap was nice for me.”
Wilson held on to second in the No. 02 Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing Honda/Dallara, the team’s best starting position this season outside of Wilson‘s pole at Long Beach. “We came to this track completely blind,” Wilson sad. “We haven’t tested here. We still haven’t tested on a road course. The team has done a fantastic job. I’m very excited to be able to challenge for the pole position.”
Ryan Hunter-Reay will start third after Rahal Letterman Racing bagged its setup for one suggested by the driver. “We changed the car a lot overnight,” Hunter-Reay said. “It was a massive improvement. We just went with what worked with me in the car rather than going with the team’s older data. It went great.”
Series points leader Scott Dixon will start fourth in his bid to win the race for a fourth consecutive time. Dixon‘s paddle shifter malfunctioned during the final session. “The gearbox kept locking up, so we had to go to manual mode, which is a bit of a pain,” Dixon said. “Ultimately the car is pretty decent. We had more. I don’t think we had enough for pole, but I still believe we have a pretty good car for the race.”
Dixon has finished on the podium in all but one race so far this season.
Oriol Servia will start fifth and Tony Kanaan sixth. Marco Andretti, Darren Manning, Dan Wheldon and Vitor Meira round out the top 10 starters. The fastest six advanced from a series of qualifying sessions, eventually coming to the fastest six in a 10-minute session.
Helio Castroneves, who’s second in the IndyCar standings behind Dixon, will start last after the throttle cable stuck on his car during the first session, leaving him stranded on a cutoff and attempting to fix it himself. “The car went dead,” Castroneves said. “It was something with the throttle.”
Will Power was running among the fastest six in the second qualifying session when his No. 8 KV Racing Technology Honda/Dallara slid into the tires in Turn 7. He’ll start 12th in the 26-car race, which is scheduled to begin at 3:30 p.m. ET.
“There’s nothing we can do,” Power said. “We’ll just have to use the best strategy possible. Unfortunately around here you don’t get may yellows. It’s going to be tough. It’s unnecessary work for the guys. I feel really bad. Hopefully I can repay them tomorrow.”
Graham Rahal, who won a street race in St. Petersburg in April, also struggled Saturday with a car rebuilt with parts from Wilson’s spare. Rahal crashed during practice Friday; he’ll start 18th Sunday after an off-tempo qualifying effort.
“Strategy could play into our hands,” Rahal said. “We’ve got nothing to lose.”
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