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Will Power takes pole from Bourdais in Edmonton

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Breaks track record
July 21, 2007

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Will Power
Champ Car

Team Australia's Will Power, a winner two weeks ago in Toronto, broke the track record at JagFlo Raceway in Edmonton Saturday to win the pole position for Sunday's Rexall Grand Prix of Edmonton Champ Car race. 

Sebastien Bourdais will line up alongside on the front row.  Defending race winner Justin Wilson and Graham Rahal occupy the second row with Neel Jani and Bruno Junqueira 5th and 6th.

Power's lap of 58.403s (121.617 mph) was 2/10ths faster than Sebastien Bourdais turned in winning the provisional pole on Friday.  Bourdais could only manage 4th fastest time today.

Final qualifying was a fiercely competitive affair.  In the end Justin Wilson was 2nd fastest in the session, pipped to pole by just seven thousandths of a second by Team Australia's Will Power. Although Sebastien Bourdais (Newman/Haas/Lanigan) was 4th fastest, the Frenchman starts the race from 2nd by virtue of his provisional pole from Friday. Justin will line up in 3rd, sharing row 2 with Bourdais' teammate Graham Rahal.

All of the leading drivers ran the softer red Bridgestone tire compound in both qualifying stints. Justin posted his fastest lap of the session (58.410s, 121.602 mph) on the 5th lap of his first stint - the first driver to dip below 2006's track record - pitting in P1 by a clear margin of three tenths of a second from Power. After a red flag to remove Alex Figge's PCM machine from Turn 4, Justin went back out for his second stint, but being late in the session traffic was more of a problem. Justin set two laps in the 58.5 bracket, and was on course for a time in the low 58's before catching traffic, but in the end was unable to better his earlier time. Power found enough space to post a quick time of 58.403s (121.617 mph) and take pole.

"The car was feeling good", said Justin. "I was on a quicker lap and I caught Will in the last corner and lost a couple of 10ths. That lap was going to be quicker, but that's how it goes sometimes. Thanks to everyone at the #9 CDW team - they've worked hard this weekend to give me a quick car. I'm very pleased with the way things are going and I'm looking forward to the race."

Team Australia rookie Simon Pagenaud (#15 Aussie Vineyards Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) who along with his teammate Power lead the Champ Car Canadian Triple Crown standings will start eighth after a lap at 58.868 seconds (120.656 mph). Ryan Dalziel (#28 Pacific Coast Motorsports Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) earned the best start of his Champ Car career and will line up eighth.

Alex Tagliani (Tide@Wal-Mart Victory Lap Charity Program Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) will start ninth despite not being able to better his qualifying time from Friday. He will start alongside Dan Clarke (#4 Minardi Team USA Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) who earned his fourth top-10 start of the year.

Quotes

Will Power #5 Aussie Vineyards Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 1st) – “I think I did a similar thing to what Sebastien did this morning, except he spun and I corrected it, and jumped the curb, took off the front wing, did a bit of damage. But I did a time good enough earlier on in the run. So, you know, it was good. We had the speed there all weekend. I just haven't been putting laps together. We haven't had a clear run. That was pretty much my first clear lap. And, yeah, we did what we needed to do.”

Sebastien Bourdais #1 McDonalds Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 2nd) – “I don't particularly think that our car was handling better on the Bridgestone red tires. Obviously we had done a fairly good lap on the blacks. I think it was very close to the pole actually. So I was fairly happy with that. But, you know, it's not a big deal. I think there's a little balance difference. But the two sets are pretty close and work well here. Just a good day for us. I mean, we had a really good car in the 15 minutes, and it was going really well in the qualifying session. And just like Justin said, P.T. was just playing a little bit again in the last two laps and - well, pretty much the whole run, but the last two laps when it really mattered. And he backed up Bruno, and Bruno did me, and that was that. It was the last corner, so that ruined the last two laps and we had the (indiscernible) going on. A little frustrating obviously because the team did a fantastic job and the car was great. But, you know, it's going to be a long day tomorrow and we'll see what happens.”

Justin Wilson #9 CDW Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 3rd) – “the car was feeling good. Just thank everyone at the #9 CDW car that's worked hard this weekend to make it quick. So very pleased with how it went. I think, like everyone in the field, was on a quicker lap and I caught Will in the last corner and lost a couple of 10ths. That lap was going to be quicker, but that's how it goes sometimes.”

Graham Rahal #2 Medi | Zone Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 4th) - “It was a good day for the whole Medi | Zone team. The whole weekend has been solid. We’ve been third in every single session so far so. We’re just happy to be less than a tenth of a second off pole. At the end of the day we know we had a lap that was quick enough to be on pole. I know drivers say this all the time we really did have a lap that was one-tenth and a half up right at the end. I just got into Turn 11 a little too hot and locked up the right front and went wide and lost the time. For sure we were really quick and definitely had a pole car but just didn’t put it together. We hope that tomorrow will be a good event for the Medi | Zone team. The last airport circuit track in Cleveland was successful for us. We had a good run although the results don’t show it. This weekend has been solid so maybe the airport circuits have been good to us.”

Bruno Junqueira #19 Sonny’s Bar-B-Q Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 6th) – "I was happy with the car ran today. I was able to post a faster time than yesterday. I'm pleased to be starting in sixth position and think that I can make a run to the front early into the race. There is a good chance that i can have a podium finish tomorrow if all goes right. My team has done an outstanding job this weekend giving me a fast car. I'm looking forward to the race tomorrow."

Simon Pagenaud #15 Aussie Vineyards Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 7th) – “It has been a rough day. We’ve had a good Aussie Vineyards car all day long and I guess qualifying didn’t go the way that we had wanted. We had a good car in the first stint with red tires. I did a decent lap, a 58.8, which was a P4, and when we went back out on track the red tires worked really well on one lap and then I got blocked in the last lap by Mr. Doornbos. I guess he still doesn’t get the rules of Champ Car. I don’t know what to say, it’s just very disappointing because obviously we had a better car than seventh, because the car was much quicker than that. The whole crew has done a great job and we have a great race car for tomorrow. I expect that we will do good in the race and we can get back up there.”

Ryan Dalziel #28 PCM Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 8th) – “I am really happy. It’s been a good weekend and I am really proud of my team. I am getting used to the track. This is by far the most difficult and intimidating track I’ve been to. With the limited amount of practice time and of course no test time being it is an active airport, it is tough to learn as quick as we need to but that is our job. At the same time, once you get it, it is a blast and now probably one of my favorites!”

Alex Tagliani #8 RSPORTS Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 9th) – “Today did not go as well as we were expecting or hoping for. I am not happy, we are going slower then we were yesterday. I do not know what exactly is going on, but we have a lot of work to do so that we hopefully can have a decent race tomorrow in the #8 Tide@Wal-Mart Victory Lap Charity Program car.”

“Speedy” Dan Clarke #4 Team Minardi USA Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 10th) – “We recovered well from yesterday and knew we could do well in today’s qualification. We were playing catch-up a bit since we missed an entire session yesterday but I think we are good for the race. We had a few wrinkles in the set-up as a result of this, but we are satisfied to be in the top ten, even if it would have been nice to be a bit closer to the front. All the guys did a great job bringing the car back together and I’m grateful to them for that. There were so many red flags out there today, and I think anything could happen in the race, but at least we’re starting in the top ten.”

Robert Doornbos #14 Team Minardi USA Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 11th) – “This was obviously a disappointing qualifying session for us. It started out with the overall feeling of the car improved as a result of changes we made during the morning practice session, but then on my second run this afternoon, on fresh reds, I encountered a shifting problem. This was later traced to the car’s power supply, but it meant I had to pit before completing the run. It’s not great to be starting from 11th on the grid, but it’s definitely possible to get a podium from there, and that’s what we’ll be aiming for tomorrow.”

Jan Heylen #34 Champ Car Grand Prix of Belgium Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 12th) – “We are not where we were hoping to be today. The entire team tried hard so now we’ll try to make it better for tomorrow and work toward completing our race. It was a very eventful qualifying and I feel that we could have gone faster but everyone faced the challenges of the stop and go pace. Tomorrow is going to be a tough race physically so I just have to focus on preparing myself for the event and make the best of my qualifying. I know we will have a good result if we can finish the race so we’ll work on getting through the first few laps.”

Oriol Servia #7 INDECK Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 13th) – “It’s been a tough weekend for us, we just can’t seem to get the car to handle. We’ve made a lot of changes but we haven’t been able to find the right balance. It’s very frustrating, everybody in the Team is working extremely hard and hopefully we can find some speed for the race tomorrow. We are starting near the back so we might have to look at some alternative strategies, the last few races have been pretty crazy so you never know what’s going to happen.”

Paul Tracy #3 INDECK Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 14th) – “It’s extremely frustrating, we just can’t get the car right, we have no grip and we have no balance. We thought we had made some improvements in practice but then during qualifying I went out and the car was extremely loose, I spun on my first lap and had a pretty hard shunt. It knocked the wind out of me for a few seconds, I really just had no confidence on the car after that. My crew fixed the car and after the red flag we tried to improve our time but the car was just all over the place and we couldn’t go any quicker. We really just have to put everything behind and us and go out and pick up a bunch of positions tomorrow.”

Katherine Legge #11 Dale Coyne Racing Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 15th) – "My team did an outstanding job today getting the car ready for second round qualifying. I honestly didn't think I was going to be able to qualify today after I hit the wall in morning practice. The damage was quite extensive. Even though I was only able to get out for five laps of qualifying today, it was a moral victory for the Dale Coyne Racing team. The crew gets all the credit for there awesome work. I think that I should be competitive in the race tomorrow and should be able to move up through the field, especially since I'm right behind Paul Tracy."

Alex Figge #29 PCM Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone (Qualified 16th) -”We’re having a bit of a tough go of it. This is not an easy place, but at the same time I think we have made progress, despite my off. It is going to be tough tomorrow, I am looking for an incident free race.”

Starting Lineup

Pos Driver # Team Lap Time Mph Behind
1 W. Power 5 Team Australia 58.403 121.617  
2 S. Bourdais 1 Newman/ Haas/ Lanigan Racing 58.596 121.216 0.193
3 J. Wilson 9 RSPORTS 58.410 121.602 0.007
4 G. Rahal 2 Newman/ Haas/ Lanigan Racing 58.485 121.447 0.082
5 N. Jani 21 PKV Racing 58.762 120.874 0.359
6 B. Junqueira 19 Dale Coyne Racing 58.846 120.701 0.443
7 S. Pagenaud 15 Team Australia 58.868 120.656 0.465
8 R. Dalziel 28 Pacific Coast Motorsports 59.256 119.866 0.853
9 A. Tagliani 8 RSPORTS 59.483 119.409 1.080
10 D. Clarke 4 Minardi Team USA 59.503 119.369 1.100
11 R. Doornbos 14 Minardi Team USA 59.553 119.269 1.150
12 J. Heylen 34 Conquest Racing 59.561 119.253 1.158
13 O. Servia 7 Forsythe Championship Racing 59.582 119.210 1.179
14 P. Tracy 3 Forsythe Championship Racing 1:00.107 118.169 1.704
15 K. Legge 11 Dale Coyne Racing 1:00.222 117.944 1.819
16 T. Gommendy   PKV Racing      
17 A. Figge 29 Pacific Coast Motorsports 1:00.937 116.560 2.534

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