Andretti on Pole Again at Road America

His brilliant lasty-gasp effort took the top spot from Juan Montoya, while Gil de Ferran takes the number three starting position followed by Christian Fittipaldi and Helio Castro-Neves.

Andretti started the day with the provisional pole after Friday's qualifying session.

But as the slower cars from Friday set out for the first Saturday qualifying session, Andretti's Friday time fell as Adrian Fernandez turned in the fast lap of the session.

Fernandez soon lost the pole as the faster drivers took to the track for the final session. The competition was fierce between the top three qualifiers.

Gil de Ferran held onto the pole for several minutes but as the clock ticked toward the end of the session, Montoya turned in a lap two-tenths of a second faster than de Ferran.

As luck would have it, both drivers ran out of fuel before the end of the session so they simply had to sit back and watch Andretti take the pole back as the checkered flag waved.

Andretti praised his new Ford engine saying, ' I have to give credit to Ford on this one. The engine was perfect. I mean this is the best engine I have ever had. We were just flying down the straightaways and I think that had a lot to do with how we got the pole.'

He added that the car was in great shape for the race.

Montoya was equally pleased with his showing. He actually ran off the road and through the grass toward the end of the session. According to Montoya, he still didn't have the perfect setup for the session.

'After my first run, we added more front wing to the car, but the understeer still was there. That's what happened on my last lap, the car just understeered off the last corner.'

The rookie driver from Colombia still leads the championship battle by 25 points.

The number two man in the championship battle will start third on the grid tomorrow. Gil de Ferran has finished on the podium in the last three races, including a win at Portland. Running out of fuel was a scenario he couldn't have imagined today.

'It's a shame, the guys really got the car up to speed and the car was very, very good today. I don't know if we had enough for the pole, but we wou ld've made them sweat a little!'

Defending Road America champ Dario Franchitti had two terrible qualifying although he has secured the number seven spot on the grid.

'Seventh is all right, but it would've been nicer to end up a bit higher up the grid.'

Franchitti started sixth here last year and the win was the first of his CART career.

With his pole position today, Andretti now has 32 pole positions to his credit making him the second highest qualifier in CART history.

Rick Mears is the still pole king having scored 39 poles in his career. Michael's father Mario is number three on the list with 30 pole positions in his career.

The Texaco Havoline 200 has been lengthened by five laps (20 miles) to enhance the competition on track tomorrow.

In the past the race has been decided off the track and officials decided to make sure that wasn't the case this year. It is good news for both drivers and fans. Andretti believes it will change things on the track.

'I think now you are going to have a situation where everybody just goes for it,' he said.

Final qualifying times from Road America