Franchitti fastest on Friday

Team KOOL Green's Scot lapped in 1m14.838s to pip morning pacesetter Patrick Carpentier (Player's/Forsythe) by 0.3s at the end of the day.

Franchitti, who has not won a race since October 1999, started from the front row in Detroit last year, equalling the time of polesitter Juan Montoya.

Third fastest was Bruno Junqueira, Ganassi's rookie continuing his impressive recent form, despite bringing out the red flags by crashing and rearranging the tyre barriers within minutes of the morning session starting. Paul Tracy, Helio Castroneves, Tony Kanaan and Max Papis also made contact with the walls during the day, but none sustained any serious damage.

PacWest's Mauricio Gugelmin and Penske's Helio Castroneves completed the top five, but points leader Kenny Brack was down in 15th, a second off the pace.

The fact that Honda and Ford-powered cars filled the top two positions was ironic as both manufacturers boycotted the morning session as a protest against CART's newly-imposed spacer regulations (see separate stories).