Bourdais secures Edmonton pole

The Newman/Haas driver set his quickest time of 58.560 seconds (121.291mph) to take his fourth pole of the season and the 22nd of his Champ Car career but admitted that it was by no means a given.

Bourdais commented: "The team made a few changes overnight, but what was more crucial is that the track came to us in terms of grip, as more and more rubber had gone down. Down at Turn 1, there was a headwind yesterday which became a tailwind today, which I thought would make it trickier, but the extra grip meant it was actually better today."

However, the Frenchman said that it could have been one of four drivers in pole, and his comment was proven by the fact that Paul Tracy of Forsythe Championship Racing actually set a faster time - by 0.007 seconds - but had it deleted for causing a red flag at the start of the session when he spun at Turn 7 and knocked off his rear wing against the tyres."

"Yeah, we knew it was gonna be choppy session," said Tracy, "but then we went and caused the first red. We had a voltmeter fail, which sent the dashboard crazy, and the no-lift shifter stopped working so I locked up the gearbox and spun at Turn 7.

"So knowing that we should have been on pole means it's kind of mixed fortunes for us, but it's good to be on the front row for the first time this year."

Justin Wilson of RuSPORT grabbed third, despite appearing to be baulked by Will Power of Team Australia. The Briton was just 0.105 seconds off Bourdais, and admitted he was slightly disappointed with the inside of the second row of the grid.

"I thought we had more potential in the car and in me," he said, "but I overdid it a couple of times, got held up a couple of times... This is a track where you need to build up a good rhythm, so you brake a little deeper into the braking zones, carry a little more speed through the corners, and with all the reds flying out there, it meant we never got that rhythm going. I suppose it was quite comical in some ways, but for the drivers it's just frustrating."

Forsythe's AJ Allmendinger, winner of the last three rounds of this year's Champ Car season wound up fourth, and never seemed to be quite in the hunt for fastest time. He ended the session with a minor spin, and a little over 0.3 seconds off Bourdais' pole lap.

Oriol Servia wrung the neck of the PKV Racing entry to take fifth fastest, but his team-mate Katherine Legge suffered more than most with the disrupted session and with traffic.

She freefalled down the time sheets to wind up 14th fastest today, and will start 15th. Compatriot Dan Clarke who, like Legge, had starred in this morning's session, was even worse off, losing his CTE Racing-HVM entry under braking for the final turn and backing hard into the wall.

Power was docked his fastest lap for blocking Wilson, and relinquished a superb sixth place on the grid to CTE's Nelson Philippe. However, Power remained ahead of Team Australia team-mate Alex Tagliani who will start 11th, after spinning his final flyer away.

Andrew Ranger of Conquest did a superb job to clock eighth, but Bruno Junqueira of Newman/Haas had to rely on his Friday time after bending a left-rear wishbone with a trip across the grass.

Dale Coyne Racing's pairing of Mario Dominguez and Jan Heylen largely (if not completely) kept their heads when all about them were losing theirs, and will start 10th and 12th.

Combined qualifying times:

Pos  Driver              Team                Time
 1.  Sebastien Bourdais  Newman/Haas       58.560
 2.  Paul Tracy          Forsythe          58.622
 3.  Justin Wilson       RuSPORT           58.665
 4.  AJ Allmendinger     Forsythe          58.893
 5.  Oriol Servia        PKV               59.324
 6.  Will Power          Team Australia    59.460
 7.  Nelson Philippe     CTE-HVM           59.510
 8.  Andrew Ranger       Conquest        1:00.071
 9.  Bruno Junqueira     Newman/Haas     1:00.085
10.  Mario Dominguez     Dale Coyne      1:00.106
11.  Alex Tagliani       Team Australia  1:00.110
12.  Jan Heylen          Dale Coyne      1:00.199
13.  Charles Zwolsman    Conquest        1:00.291
14.  Cristiano da Matta  RuSPORT         1:00.305
15.  Katherine Legge     PKV             1:00.358
16.  Nicky Pastorelli    Rocketsports    1:00.978
17.  Dan Clarke          CTE-HVM         1:01.215
18.  Tonis Kasemets      Rocketsports    1:01.704