JOLIET, Ill., July 8 (UPI) -- Paul Tracy took the provisional pole on Friday for Sunday's Molson Indy Toronto Champ Car race.
Tracy earned one championship point for the provisional pole and a guaranteed front row starting position for the race. He leads Sebastien Bourdais in the overall standings by just two points (129-127).
Bourdais won last year's pole with a best lap of 58.558 seconds. The track record is 57.143 seconds set in 1999 by Gil de Ferran.
Bourdais is the defending race and series champion.
Alex Tagliani, Cristiano da Matta and Mario Dominguez completed the top five.
A total of 18 drivers took to the track including six rookies. The top qualifying rookie was Bjorn Wirdheim.
Tony Stewart, winner of the last two Nextel Cup races at Sonoma and Daytona, crashed his primary car in practice.
Final qualifying is set for Saturday afternoon. The race is scheduled for Sunday.
