Three-time Champ Car World Series champion Sebastien Bourdais moved one point closer to clinching a record breaking fourth consecutive crown after clinching pole position today in Assen for tomorrow's Bavaria Champ Car Grand Prix of Holland presented by Audi, Gant, Hertz, Pioneer and Jumbo.
Bourdais now has a 54 point lead over Dutch local hero Robert Doornbos. If the Frenchman wins again tomorrow and takes a European clean-sweep, Doornbos will have to finish sixth or better to ensure the title chase continues to the next round of the series in Australia on October 21.
Bourdais (#1 McDonald’s Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) earned his sixth pole position of the season and the 31st of his career. He lapped the 4.55km circuit in a track record time of 1 minute 18.765 seconds (129.347 mph) after only being able to post the sixth best time in Saturday morning’s practice session.
Nearly every driver improved their time from the morning session but none as much as Bourdais, as he bettered his morning lap by nearly two seconds. The French driver will be joined on the front row by Justin Wilson (#9 CDW Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone), who earned his starting spot during Friday’s rain soaked qualifying. This marks the third time this season the two have shared the front row.
Four rookies will fill the next two rows on the starting grid with the PKV Racing duo of Tristan Gommendy (#22 Pay By Touch-MegaSpirea Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) and Neel Jani (#21 Red Bull-Gulfstream Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) starting third and fourth respectively. Gommendy seems to favour the natural terrain road courses, having earned the pole position earlier this season at Mont-Tremblant.
Making up the third row are 2006 Champ Car Atlantic rivals, Simon Pagenaud (#15 Aussie Vineyards Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) and Graham Rahal (#2 Medi|Zone Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone). While Rahal has been on the podium after the last two events and has been there for times this season, Pagenaud is still looking for his first top three finish.
Belgian driver Jan Heylen (#34 Grafiprint Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) posted his best qualifying effort of the season, placing his Conquest Racing machine seventh on the grid. Heylen will start alongside Australian driver Will Power (#5 Aussie Vineyards Cosworth/DP01/Bridgestone) who lines up eighth.
QUOTES FROM THE TOP THREE QUALIFIERS
Sebastien Bourdais: "To be honest I didn't think we were going to be P1. In the first 15 minutes, it felt like it, but then in the first run we just really struggled and we had not changed much on the McDonald’s car. So I didn't know what really happened. On the second and third run, when we went out with the Red Bridgestone alternate tyres, it was fantastic; the car came alive and I had a great time. Like I said this place is fantastic. It's really fast and a lot of fun when the car is working."
Justin Wilson: “I’m very disappointed with our lack of pace today. We just couldn’t quite work it out in qualifying and had a few problems. A rear tyre delaminated during our second stint, but I’m not sure if that was all of our problem or not. We’re fortunate that we got the front row slot from yesterday and now we’ve got to concentrate on making a good race car.”
Tristan Gommendy: “I think the Pay By Touch MegaSpirea PKV Racing team had a good qualification. We came here without a lot of pressure on us because the season is almost over. But, we worked hard and we came up with quite a good setup. Dry track, wet track it did not make a difference. We were quick. We did some good fine tuning between the morning practice and this afternoon. My engineer, Yves Touron, did a good job, because the car was exactly how it was suppose to be."
DOORNBOS FORCED TO FIGHT FROM MID PACK TOMORROW Local hero Robert Doornbos will start from position nine in tomorrow's Bavaria Beer Champ Car Grand Prix of Holland - a disappointing start for the man who ran at the front of the pack in last week's race in Belgium.
Doornbos ran second in the opening laps, then faded in the Zolder event but now has his sights set on reversing the trend at Assen - moving forward from a poor qualifying start.
"In Zolder, we were second early in the race and finished the race seventh - so to start now from ninth, maybe it's good fortune," Doornbos said.
"It’s shocking that we couldn't get a good car in qualifying basically. It's not like we have one problem to address. It just isn’t a very fast car.
"But it happened before this year that we struggled in qualifying but that the car was really fast in the race. The races are also very long and we know from the past in Champ Car, a lot can happen. But it will be tight into turn one and we just need to make the best of it."
The Bavaria Beer Champ Car Grand Prix of Holland presented by Audi, Gant, Hertz, Pioneer and Jumbo will begin at 1 p.m. local time (7 a.m. ET) tomorrow. The race can be seen live in Europe on Eurosport 2 and in the United States on ESPN Classic. Fans can also follow all of the action via the official website of the Champ Car World Series, www.champcar.ws
