Charlie Kimball was delighted to secure his maiden Verizon IndyCar Series pole position as he took top spot for the Rainguard Water Sealers 600 at Texas Motor Speedway on Friday.
The Chip Ganassi Racing driver set a two lap average of 222.556mph to deny team-mate Scott Dixon by the tiniest of margins, with just 0.083 seconds separating the duo, but for Kimball, racing in his 109th IndyCar race this weekend, it meant a lot to finally put the car on the pole.
“I’m really excited to be on pole,” admitted Kimball. “The guys totally deserve it. Everyone at Chip Ganassi Racing has been working so hard and the boys have had my back all year long through the good, the bad, and the ugly.
“It’s so nice to be able to repay them with a pole position here at Texas Motor Speedway. The No. 83 Tresiba Honda was really good right out of the box and Todd made a few adjustments that made it better during the course of practice. During qualifying we just took a swing at it and went out and got the job done.”
Championship leader Dixon was forced to settle for the outside of the front row but has shown good pace all weekend long in Texas, with the New Zealander admitting that the way the Texas weekend generally plays out, where you start is generally not that important.
“Obviously the weather is much different than when we tested and it’s supposed to be a lot warmer tomorrow, but we learned some things and it was a good practice session this morning for the No. 9 car and the team,” said Dixon.
“It really doesn’t matter where you qualify here, but I think we’ve got a decent set-up to go after it tomorrow in the NTT Data Honda.
“Congrats to Charlie and the No. 83 team for their first pole. Great team effort today and looking forward to tomorrow.”
