The Pocono winner had the perfect conditions to make his qualifying run as the sun went down, but such was Penske-Chevrolet’s superiority here at the 1.25-mile oval that even the team's driver who went early – Simon Pagenaud – qualified fourth, to complete a Penske 1-2-3-4.

Ed Carpenter in his self-owned machine believes he could have gotten closer to the Penskes had he been more aggressive with downforce levels, but was content to grab fifth ahead of the first of the Hondas, Takuma Sato’s Andretti Autosport machine.

Scott Dixon of Chip Ganassi Racing-Honda will roll off seventh ahead of the top AJ Foyt Racing-Chevy, that of Carlos Munoz, who earned his best starting spot of the season.

Alexander Rossi was ninth fastest in another Andretti car, and while James Hinchcliffe’s 10^th place looks mediocre, in fact it was a huge improvement over his form in practice, especially considering he was one of the earliest runners.

Max Chilton was able to beat two of his Ganassi teammates, Tony Kanaan and Charlie Kimball, while the returning Sebastien Bourdais admitted that the problem with his run wasn’t his #18 Dale Coyne Racing-Honda, but his own self confidence in Turns 1 and 2.

Marco Andretti felt he’d gone too aggressive on setup, suffered a sideways moment on his second lap and will roll off 20^th, ahead of only Sebastian Saavedra.

There will be an hour-long practice starting at 10pm Eastern, 9pm local time, that will more accurately represent what the drivers will encounter tomorrow night, when the race starts at 8.45pm local time.

Gateway, IndyCar qualifying

Cla	#	Driver	Time	Gap	Mph
1	12	Will Power	47.4579		189.642
2	2	Josef Newgarden	47.7921	0.3342	188.316
3	3	Helio Castroneves	48.0109	0.5530	187.457
4	1	Simon Pagenaud	48.1936	0.7357	186.747
5	20	Ed Carpenter	48.7731	1.3152	184.528
6	26	Takuma Sato	48.8637	1.4058	184.186
7	9	Scott Dixon	48.9536	1.4957	183.848
8	14	Carlos Munoz	49.0144	1.5565	183.620
9	98	Alexander Rossi	49.0254	1.5675	183.578
10	5	James Hinchcliffe	49.0389	1.5810	183.528
11	4	Conor Daly	49.1043	1.6464	183.283
12	19	Ed Jones	49.2073	1.7494	182.900
13	15	Graham Rahal	49.2260	1.7681	182.830
14	28	Ryan Hunter-Reay	49.3073	1.8494	182.529
15	21	J.R. Hildebrand	49.3154	1.8575	182.499
16	8	Max Chilton	49.3769	1.9190	182.271
17	10	Tony Kanaan	49.3976	1.9397	182.195
18	83	Charlie Kimball	49.4133	1.9554	182.137
19	18	Sébastien Bourdais	49.4924	2.0345	181.846
20	27	Marco Andretti	49.6713	2.2134	181.191
21	7	Sebastian Saavedra	50.6471	3.1892	177.700