Herta Takes Phoenix Pole

Herta just edged out Homestead winner and Andretti Green teammate Dan Wheldon to take pole position for the race

"I'm really happy with the time we put up," said Herta. "This run is really for the guys on the XM Satellite Radio crew because we had a huge crash with this car two weeks ago at Homestead and they worked their tails off to put it back together.

"The car is running really well now and they did a great job. This is fastest that we've run, so I'm happy with it."

The qualifying session saw three drivers fail to set a time. Two of these drivers were Patrick Carpentier and rookie Paul Dana, both crashing in practice on Friday. The other driver not to take part in qualifying was Tony Kanaan, who changed an engine after the original powerplant began overheating on Friday.

Penske's Helio Castroneves was next, ahead of Panther's Tomas Scheckter, with another Andretti Green driver in Dario Franchitti completing the top five.

Dallaras fill the top seven places on the grid, though on the engine side the battle is much more even, with three makes in the top four places.

XM Satellite Radio Indy 200, Phoenix International Raceway qualifying results:

Pos  Driver              Team               Speed
 1.  Bryan Herta         Dallara-Honda      176.612 mph
 2.  Dan Wheldon         Dallara-Honda      176.475 mph
 3.  Helio Castroneves   Dallara-Toyota     176.081 mph
 4.  Tomas Scheckter     Dallara-Chevrolet  176.068 mph
 5.  Dario Franchitti    Dallara-Honda      175.801 mph
 6.  Sam Hornish Jr.     Dallara-Toyota     175.772 mph
 7.  Tomas Enge          Dallara-Chevrolet  175.641 mph
 8.  Scott Dixon         Panoz-Toyota       175.439 mph
 9.  Scott Sharp         Panoz-Honda        175.362 mph
10.  Buddy Rice          Panoz-Honda        175.115 mph
11.  Darren Manning      Panoz-Toyota       174.864 mph
12.  Vitor Meira         Panoz-Honda        174.617 mph
13.  Roger Yasukawa      Dallara-Honda      174.403 mph
14.  Ryan Briscoe        Panoz-Toyota       174.344 mph
15.  Kosuke Matsuura     Panoz-Honda        174.211 mph
16.  Alex Barron         Dallara-Toyota     172.377 mph
17.  A.J. Foyt IV        Dallara-Toyota     170.619 mph
18.  Danica Patrick      Dallara-Honda      169.247 mph
19.  Ed Carpenter        Dallara-Toyota     165.779 mph
20.  Patrick Carpentier  Dallara-Toyota     -
21.  Tony Kanaan         Dallara-Honda      -
22.  Paul Dana           Dallara-Toyota     -