Power secures Surfers pole

The Team Australia driver from Toowomba, about two hours drive from the circuit, slung his DP01-Cosworth around the spectacular and daunting 2.795-mile street course, with a sequence of four stunning laps, the last of which was enough to elevate him 0.37 seconds above his nearest pursuer.

The 1:30.204 lap was Power's fourth pole of the season, his fifth overall, and finally beat Cristiano da Matta's five year-old lap record for Newman/Haas Racing.

"We just have a really good car," said the relieved-looking Australian, "and I know it's strong enough to win tomorrow. We spent morning practice practicing on full fuel loads and it was great."

Recalling his final efforts of the session, Power stated: "They were the hardest four laps I've ever done in my life. But actually, I was on an even quicker one when Mario Dominguez got in the way.

"But you know, this is just a small part of the weekend. We did this last year, but hopefully we'll get a different result," he added, referring to the mid-race incident where Sebastien Bourdais dive-bombed him at Turn 3, and bent his suspension. "At least Sebastien isn't right behind me this time."

Bourdais isn't too far away though, the Frenchman stopping the clocks less than 0.4 seconds shy of the pole-sitter, and booking himself fourth grid slot.

The man starting directly behind Power will be none other than Paul Tracy, who did his traditionally excellent job here at Surfers Paradise to set second fastest time, comfortably his best qualifying result since starting on the front row at Las Vegas, the season opener.

Owing to Oriol Servia's fastest time in Friday qualifying, the PKV Racing car will start on the front row, despite his best effort of the day being over six tenths slower than Power.

Justin Wilson will start a slightly underwhelming fifth fastest, alongside Power's impressive Team Australia partner Simon Pagenaud. The Frenchman is top rookie in the field, while Neel Jani recovered some confidence to put the second PKV car in eighth.

Pos  Driver           Team                   Time
 1.  Will Power       Team Australia         1:30.054
 2.  Oriol Servia     PKV Racing             1:30.693 + 0.639
 3.  Paul Tracy       Forsythe Championship  1:30.426 + 0.372
 4.  S. Bourdais      Newman/Haas/Lanigan    1:30.438 + 0.384
 5.  Justin Wilson    RuSPORT                1:30.586 + 0.532
 6.  Simon Pagenaud   Team Australia         1:31.038 + 0.984
 7.  Bruno Junqueira  Dale Coyne Racing      1:31.212 + 1.158
 8.  Neel Jani        PKV Racing             1:31.281 + 1.227
 9.  Graham Rahal     Newman/Haas/Lanigan    1:31.347 + 1.293
10.  Dan Clarke       Minardi Team USA       1:31.413 + 1.359
11.  Alex Tagliani    Rocketsports Racing    1:31.664 + 1.610
12.  Mario Dominguez  Pacific Coast          1:31.746 + 1.692
13.  Nelson Philippe  Conquest Racing        1:31.842 + 1.788
14.  Robert Doornbos  Minardi Team USA       1:31.969 + 1.915
15.  Alex Figge       Pacific Coast          1:32.458 + 2.404
16.  Katherine Legge  Dale Coyne Racing      1:32.694 + 2.640
17.  David Martínez   Forsythe Championship  1:33.892 + 3.838