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Castroneves storms to pole at Indianapolis

Helio Castroneves celebrates taking pole position © Getty Images

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They hoped that changing the qualifying format would keep pole position in doubt until the 6 p.m. gun. Helio Castroneves settled it by 4.34pm. The 35-year-old Brazilian lived up to his reputation as an Indianapolis specialist by claiming his fourth career pole for the Indianapolis 500 on May 30.

Castroneves did it in a crushing manner. He was fastest in the initial five-hour qualifying session, and running first in the 90-minute top-nine shootout, he laid down a 227.990-mph average as the number to beat. Nobody came close. Castroneves' Team Penske colleague Will Power qualified second at 227.578 mph, and Dario Franchitti put a Target Chip Ganassi Racing car on the outside of the front row at 226.990 mph.

Power, Franchitti, and their team-mates Ryan Briscoe (Penske) and Scott Dixon (Ganassi) all made multiple runs in the last 45 minutes. But nobody had an answer for Castroneves, who posted the only 228-mph speed of the month during his four-lap qualifying run.

"I'm not surprised he's on the pole [but] I don't know how he found that time," said Castroneves' former team-mate Gil de Ferran, now co-owner of De Ferran Dragon Racing. "From 26 to 28 is truly astounding. "Helio is extremely good. He's a great driver who has a magical touch here."

The new format was popular in most quarters, though the IndyCar Series drivers were certainly put to the test in what is already one of the most stressful days of their season. "I think Chip got his money's worth today," said Franchitti.

The other story of the day at Indy was Andretti Autosport's shockingly poor performance and Danica Patrick's troubling reaction to it. Patrick has been surprisingly off the pace at Indianapolis this year and her 23rd-place qualifying run Saturday was representative of her standing in the field all week.

What happened next was unusual. When she tried to lay the blame on her team during her IMS Public Address interview, the crowd lining pit road began to shower Patrick with boos. "I've never been outside the top 10 on a finish or qualifying, so ... um ... it's not my fault," she said. "The car is not good."

She didn't let up on her attack on AA's engineering staff when she talked to the media a half-hour later. "My crew has worked their heart out and it's a good car," she said. "It just has a bad set-up."

Meanwhile, AA team leader Tony Kanaan crashed on the first lap of his qualifying run and Marco Andretti and Ryan Hunter-Reay could only manage the sixth row - qualifying 16th and 17th, respectively. John Andretti was bumped from the field and along with Kanaan will attempt to qualify Sunday.

Graham Rahal was one of the day's best stories, slotting the Rahal Letterman Racing entry into seventh place. And Alex Tagliani and the FAZZT Race team showed their quick practice laps all week weren't a fluke by qualifying fifth.

Also notable was Ed Carpenter's run to eighth place in Vision Racing's first appearance of the 2010 season. On the flip side, KV Racing had a miserable day. Takuma Sato crashed in practice and EJ Viso wiped off the rear wing of his car during a qualifying run. Viso came back to qualify 19th, but Paul Tracy suffered a gearbox failure on his first attempt and couldn't find enough speed to crack the top 24 in two subsequent runs. The final nine spots in next Sunday's race - 25-33 - will be settled on Bump Day.

Blessed with ideal weather, the revised Indy qualifying format lived up to expectations. There was interest in the attempts to get into the top nine and the top 24, and the shootout produced the top speeds of the month and put the stars on the track in front of the fans a lot more than they would have been in the past.

Indy traditionalists will probably disagree, but it looked like another positive step in terms of modernising the Indianapolis 500 and rebuilding interest in Pole Day.

John Oreovicz covers open-wheel racing for ESPN.com

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