It was a fairytale debut for A.J. Allmendinger today with the Forsythe Team as he took Provisional Pole for the G.I. Joe's Presents the Champ Car Grand Prix of Portland in his first day driving the #7 Indeck car. source: champcarworldseries.com Allmendinger, who only met his new engineers and mechanics yesterday, managed to put a lap in of 58.378 seconds at the very end of the Friday Qualifying session, guaranteeing him a front row start for Sunday's race. Paul Tracy also had a great run today and secured third position with a lap of 59.121 seconds around Portland International Raceway. This will be the second consecutive year that Allmendinger starts on the front row in Portland, and the fourth race in a row that he placed himself in the top 3 of the starting grid during the 2006 Champ Car Season. A.J. Allmendinger - Provisional Pole - 58.378s / 121.114mph / 194.914kph #7 INDECK Ford-Cosworth/Bridgestone/Lola "I think from the start of the weekend, including yesterday, Forsythe has done a great job to get me here and get me in the car and fitted correctly. More than anything, the team just really made me feel like at home, they're excited to have me here. For the first time in a while, I was able to come to the track today and have fun and be happy and really enjoy myself. Practice, the team did a great job to get out there and get a good feel of the car. In qualifying, we were about a 10th off of Sebastien on the black tires, and we thought we could go out there and put the reds on. Especially, if Sebastien didn't, maybe steal one. Fortunately it worked out because the red came out when I first went out there, so I had already done about two laps on the tires. After that, as Paul said, there was a ton of traffic. I think I was probably the last guy in line. It might have been the most ugly pole lap anybody's ever seen because I about crashed in turn one because everybody has been dropping wheels, so there was dirt all over the track. I tried to top that by crashing even harder in turn seven, but somehow stayed on the track. I really don't know how I got pole, but thanks to Forsythe and especially Red Bull for sticking behind me in the tough times. We'll take it."
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