TORONTO — A little extra gas went a long way for Scott Dixon in qualifying at the Honda Indy Toronto.
While the rest of the drivers went into the pits following their third round, the 35-year-old IndyCar veteran squeaked in one more lap and it proved to be the difference as he took the pole position Saturday.
The New Zealand native, who is a two-time winner of the event after capturing both legs of the 2013 race, finished his lap in 59.9073 seconds. Dixon also took the pole in the second leg of the 2013 races.
"I was just trying to get the most out of it, man," Dixon said. "Each lap just kept getting a bit better so that was the just of it. It’s not what we planned on, we just planned to do three laps. We luckily had a little bit more gas in the car to do a fourth."
"Worked out nicely for a change."
Dixon will start at the front of the field for the first time this season and 24th time in his career in Sunday afternoon’s race in the streets surrounding Toronto’s Exhibition Place. His pole win moved him ahead of Johnny Rutherford for 12th on the all-time pole list. Dixon is now one pole victory behind Toronto’s Paul Tracy, who has 25 in his career.
Helio Castroneves was second in 59.9425 while Simon Pagenaud will start third after clocking a time of one minute 0.2293 seconds.
James Hinchcliffe of Oakville, Ont., will start sixth after finishing his qualifying in 1:01.5637.
Two-time race winners Will Power and Sebastien Bourdais will start fourth and fifth, respectively.
Dixon’s only win this year came at the Phoenix Grand Prix and he’s currently fourth in the points standings.
The Chip Ganassi Racing driver used his two Toronto wins in 2013 to springboard him to an IndyCar Series championship. The four-time series champ — and reigning winner from 2015 — joked that there should be a second race on Sunday, but did say that his winning lap was a bit unexpected.
"I think we had a lot of build up," he said. "So each lap I’m like ‘Oh, this sucks, we’re not going to be very quick here.’ And then each lap kept on getting better."
It’s Hinchcliffe’s best starting position on his home course after beginning in eighth in the first leg of both the 2013 and 2014 races. The 29-year-old missed the 2015 version of the race due to injury.
"We’re going to have to try and find a little bit more in ourselves over the course of the evening and warm up tomorrow," Hinchcliffe said. "But definitely we’re in as good of a position here this weekend as we’ve ever been here and it would be nice to get that first win of the season and to do it here would be second to only the (Indianapolis) 500."
Qualification starts by splitting the drivers into two groups of 11 with each group getting 10 minutes to achieve their fastest lap. The top six are then taken from each group to compete against each other before the third round features a shootout of the six fastest cars.
Hinchcliffe just squeaked into the second round of qualifications by six hundredths of a second, completing his best lap in 1:00.6291. He once again edged into the third round in 1:00.4584.
The Schmidt Peterson Motorsports driver has five top-10 finishes entering the Indy Toronto — highlighted by a third-place finish at the Grand Prix of Indianapolis in May.
Notes: Defending champion Josef Newgarden will start eighth on Sunday… IndyCar officials announced Saturday morning that the wall in Turn 8 has been changed to the configuration used in previous years, which gives an additional six feet on the inside of the track. Concrete patches in Turns 1 and 9 were also worked on to provide more consistent grip.
