Bernhard takes pole for Penske

David Brabham had immediately beaten the 2007 pole time with his first flying lap in the Highcroft Acura, but Bernhard knocked the Australian off provisional pole within a few minutes.

He then withstood strong challenges from teammate Patrick Long, Brabham, and Fernandez Acura's Luis Diaz, before confirming his pole position with a 1:11.330 lap.

Bernhard reckoned his pole owed a little to his good luck in finding a gap in the traffic.

"I got a full clear lap and that was really good for me to get into a rhythm," he said. "I think on my last lap before I had to pit for fuel I had another good lap going, but then I hit some traffic. A full clear lap was what I wished for."

Diaz - whose co-driver and team owner Adrian Fernandez is racing both at Long Beach and in the Mexico City NASCAR Nationwide race this weekend - ultimately completed the front row.

"It was tough, the competition here is very good, but the team did a great job," Diaz said. "We know that we have a good race car - that's the main thing. The car has been strong all weekend."

Brabham's bid to regain pole ended when he locked up at the end of the back straight and slid into the Turn 9 barriers, bringing out the red flag for a short time.

Long had briefly made it a Penske one-two before being edged back to fourth ahead of the Andretti-Green Acura.

The LMP1 Audis were not contenders for pole on the tight street track. Lucas Luhr and Emanuele Pirro were only sixth and seventh fastest overall, although both were within half a second of Bernhard's time.

Jan Magnussen beat Corvette teammate Oliver Gavin by 0.4 seconds in the GT1 class, which once again featured only the two factory Chevrolets.

Patrick Pilet scored his first ALMS GT2 pole, leading teammate Jorg Bergmeister in a Flying Lizard Porsche one-two.

The Ferrari teams could not get on terms with the Porsches in this session. Mika Salo (Risi) was 0.6 seconds off Pilet's pace in third place, while class points leader Dirk Muller was frustrated to only manage fourth in his Tafel car.

Pos  Cl   Qualifying driver     Car                     Time
 1.  P2   Timo Bernhard         Porsche RS Spyder       1:11.330
 2.  P2   Luis Diaz             Acura ARX-01b           1:11.424
 3.  P2   David Brabham         Acura ARX-01b           1:11.448
 4.  P2   Patrick Long          Porsche RS Spyder       1:11.583
 5.  P2   Christian Fittipaldi  Acura ARX-01b           1:11.697
 6.  P1   Lucas Luhr            Audi R10 TDI            1:11.765
 7.  P1   Emanuele Pirro        Audi R10 TDI            1:11.896
 8.  P2   Guy Smith             Porsche RS Spyder       1:12.428
 9.  P2   Butch Leitzinger      Porsche RS Spyder       1:13.050
10.  P2   Ben Devlin            Mazda Lola B07-46       1:14.210
11.  P1   Jon Field             Lola B06/10 AER         1:14.580
12.  GT1  Jan Magnussen         Corvette C6.R           1:17.059
13.  GT1  Oliver Gavin          Corvette C6.R           1:17.465
14.  P1   Michael Lewis         Creation CA07-002 Judd  1:19.324
15.  GT2  Patrick Pilet         Porsche 911 GT3 RSR     1:19.705
16.  GT2  Jorg Bergmeister      Porsche 911 GT3 RSR     1:20.137
17.  GT2  Mika Salo             Ferrari 430 GT          1:20.306
18.  GT2  Dirk Mueller          Ferrari 430 GT          1:20.410
19.  GT2  Marc Basseng          Porsche 911 GT3 RSR     1:20.788
20.  GT2  Patrick Friesacher    Ferrari 430 GT          1:21.057
21.  GT2  Johnny Mowlem         Ferrari 430 GT          1:21.396
22.  GT2  Seth Neiman           Porsche 911 GT3 RSR     1:21.752
23.  GT2  Tom Milner            Panoz Esperante         1:22.229
24.  GT2  Craig Stanton         Porsche 911 GT3 RSR     1:23.003
25.  GT2  David Murry           Doran Ford GT Mk.VII    1:23.869
26.  GT2  Jonny Cocker          Aston Martin Vantage    1:24.599
27.  GT2  Lou Gigliotti         Riley Corvette C6       1:25.076
28.  GT2  Chris Hall            Dodge Viper Comp Coupe  1:25.144