Simon Pagenaud secured Team Penske’s 500th pole position in their history as he took top spot for this weekend’s Iowa Corn 300 at Iowa Speedway.
Pagenaud’s two-lap time of 34.6334 seconds was enough for the Team Penske driver to take his fifth pole of the season, denying Josef Newgarden by just 0.0404 seconds.
Helio Castroneves made it two Penske drivers inside the top three with a time of 34.7122 seconds, while Max Chilton was the best placed of the Chip Ganassi Racing drivers in fourth, just 0.0026 seconds behind the Brazilian.
Charlie Kimball and practice pacesetter Tony Kanaan will share row three, also of Chip Ganassi Racing, while row four sees Ed Carpenter alongside Team Penske’s Will Power.
Mikhail Aleshin continued his strong oval form in 2016 by taking ninth for Schmidt Peterson Motorsports, and was the only Honda representative inside the top ten, while the top ten was completed by Scott Dixon, who was the slowest of the four Chip Ganassi Racing drivers on the day.
Juan Pablo Montoya was eleventh for Penske ahead of Graham Rahal of Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, while Takuma Sato and Jack Hawksworth will share row seven for AJ Foyt Racing.
Carlos Munoz was the best placed of the Andretti Autosport quartet in fifteenth, with Alexander Rossi seventeenth behind Sebastien Bourdais, Marco Andretti nineteenth behind Gabby Chaves, and Ryan Hunter-Reay twentieth, ahead only of Conor Daly and James Hinchcliffe.
Iowa Speedway Qualifying Result
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