It was a beautiful day for Indy qualifying at Pocono and the Indy 500 winner set the pace. Ryan Hunter-Reay holding the pole for several minutes with a speed of 222.248 mph, but it didn't last long the next driver on the track Helio Castroneves took it away for a brief time with his combined lap speed of 222.517mph.
"I'm sure the track was getting better ours was pretty spot on, but now we just got to see but unfortunately we we're one of the earlier cars to go, but you got to do what you got to do hope it will be OK," said Helio Castroneves.
Then they shuffled the deck with Marco Andretti and Takuma Sato taking their turn on the tricky triangle at speeds reaching 223 mph.
"It was a somewhat pleasant run which tells me I could have trimmed it also tells me that there is some left on the table and when theirs some on the table we're going to be threatened for the pole for sure," said Marco Andretti.
Points leader Will Power had the fastest time for any driver on the track in practice and with a win on Sunday in the Pocono Indy Car 500 fueled by Sunoco it would be his 3rd win of the season.
As the track cooled Power heated up-Will Power knocking Sato from the pole with an average lap speed of 223.725 mph.
Rookie Carlos Munoz gave it his best shot and closed in on Power's time, but settled in behind the points leader at 223.083.
"Everything is much easier when you start in the front row for a really long race. It's a long race a 500 miler so qualifying is only 5 percent then there's the rest of the race," said Carlos Munoz
The final driver in qualifying Juan Pablo Montoya a familiar face from the NASCAR circuit. Montoya-machine-money he runs at 223.871 to win the pole for Sunday's Pocono Indy Car 500 fueled by Sunoco.
"It means we are going in the right direction. Things keep getting better every week and it makes it fun for me. It make it fun because the harder I work the more results I get so big motivation."
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