Baltimore IndyCar: Scott Dixon beats Will Power in wild qualifying

Power held provisional pole by 0.3 seconds with less than a minute remaining, only for Dixon to beat him with his final flying lap.

The Penske driver still had one opportunity to reclaim the advantage, but that hope was dashed when he made a mistake in the middle of the hairpin.

Dixon was fortunate to be in the Fast Six in the first place. The New Zealander was initially classified seventh in the second qualifying phase, which would have seen him eliminated had Graham Rahal not gone into the tyres at Turn 8.

Race control initially tried to manage the incident with a local yellow, but when Tristan Vautier ran into the rear of Rahal's stricken car a few moments later, the session was red-flagged.

Rahal was consequently docked his best lap time after being deemed responsible for the stoppage, thereby promoting Dixon to sixth.

Vautier escaped punishment, and remarkably, escaped with damage so minor that he was able to participate in the Fast Six a couple of minutes later.

Also of significance was the fact that both of Dixon's main championship rivals were knocked out of the second qualifying phase, meaning that Helio Castroneves and Ryan Hunter-Reay will be forced to start several rows behind the Ganassi driver.

In their absence the remaining places on the first three rows were claimed by Simon Pagenaud, Justin Wilson, Josef Newgarden and Vautier.

Both Sebastien Bourdais and EJ Viso's sessions were curtailed by damage sustained through getting things wrong at the chicane.

The latter's contact with the outside wall also left the track covered with debris that comprised the runs for other drivers late in the first phase.

It was also a tough afternoon for Dario Franchitti, who was eliminated early after struggling with a car that he said "felt decent, but just wasn't fast enough."

Pos  Driver               Team/Engine        Time        Gap
 1.  Scott Dixon          Ganassi/Honda      1m18.0838s
 2.  Will Power           Penske/Chevy       1m18.1171s  +0.0333s
 3.  Simon Pagenaud       Schmidt/Honda      1m18.4307s  +0.3469s
 4.  Justin Wilson        Coyne/Honda        1m18.8698s  +0.7860s
 5.  Josef Newgarden      Fisher/Honda       1m18.9022s  +0.8184s
 6.  Tristan Vautier      Schmidt/Honda      1m19.0380s  +0.9542s
 7.  Helio Castroneves    Penske/Chevy       1m19.0288s  Round 2
 8.  Ryan Hunter-Reay     Andretti/Chevy     1m19.0367s  Round 2
 9.  Charlie Kimball      Ganassi/Honda      1m19.0523s  Round 2
10.  Takuma Sato          Foyt/Honda         1m19.2216s  Round 2
11.  James Hinchcliffe    Andretti/Chevy     1m19.3182s  Round 2
12.  Graham Rahal         Rahal/Honda        1m22.2045s  Round 2
13.  James Jakes          Rahal/Honda        1m18.6398s  Group 1
14.  Luca Filippi         Herta/Honda        1m19.1242s  Group 2
15.  Dario Franchitti     Ganassi/Honda      1m18.6694s  Group 1
16.  Tony Kanaan          KV/Chevy           1m19.3051s  Group 2
17.  Oriol Servia         Panther/Chevy      1m18.8075s  Group 1
18.  Marco Andretti       Andretti/Chevy     1m19.4738s  Group 2
19.  Simona de Silvestro  KV/Chevy           1m18.9829s  Group 1
20.  Ed Carpenter         Carpenter/Chevy    1m20.5694s  Group 2
21.  Sebastian Saavedra   Dragon/Chevy       1m19.2440s  Group 1
22.  EJ Viso              Andretti/Chevy                 Group 2
23.  Stefan Wilson        Coyne/Honda        1m20.1871s  Group 1
24.  Sebastien Bourdais   Dragon/Chevy                   Group 2

All drivers use Dallara DW12 chassis