Friday practice 2: Tag at the top

The 28-year-old Quebec native lapped the Vancouver street circuit in 61.230 seconds to beat Helio Castroneves and Roberto Moreno.

"We unloaded a fast car this morning and it handled great," said Tagliani. "We tried a new set of tyres at the end of the afternoon session, and that's why we did a very good lap time at the end.

"The car is very easy to drive when it's handling properly," he added. "This track is very rough and it's tough to do a perfect lap. But it's the same for everyone and I think the team has done a very good job by giving me a very good handling car."

Castroneves caused a red flag with a quick spin in Turn 3, but he kept his Penske Reynard-Honda out of the wall. His best lap was a 61.438-second effort.

"The track is picking up a lot of rubber, and that's helping the times come down," remarked the championship leader. "The biggest thing is that Firestone learned last year to bring a much softer tyre compound. Last year it was very cold, and people had trouble getting heat into their tyres. The softer compound is much better in that respect."

Moreno, who managed 61.506 seconds, agreed.

"Last year tyre wear wasn't an issue," he said. "You could still get good times out of old tyres, even after more than one stint."

Gil de Ferran was pleased with fourth place, heading Cristiano da Matta, Kenny Brack and Tagliani's team mate Pat Carpentier. Morning session leader Tony Kanaan was ninth behind Max Papis.

Dario Franchitti was 10th after recovering from a troubled morning session.

"We tried a couple of developmental parts this morning and they didn't work, so we stopped on the track a couple of times," he said. "That put us behind a little bit, and we ended up having to swap cars. The car was good straightaway this afternoon, but I think we might have lost our way as the session went on. But I think we'll be okay tomorrow, because we think we understand where we went wrong.

"There are a lot of subtle differences from last year in the chassis and the engine, and the tyres are a lot softer," he added. "We're trying to juggle a lot of things."