Carpenter On Pole For Kentucky Indy 300

By Paul Gohde
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Updated: September 3, 2010

Sparta, KY – It took eight years of trying, but Butler University graduate Ed Carpenter captured his first IZOD Indy Car Series pole Friday at Kentucky Speedway. Carpenter, who started his IRL career back in 2003 with PDM Racing, turned a two-lap average of 217.993 MPH on the 1.5 mile semi-banked tri-oval to capture the $10,000 Peak Performance Pole Award.

Carpenter, who is the 10th driver to win a Kentucky Speedway pole in this, the track’s 11th Indy Racing League event, backed up a spectacular near win last year with the first pole run for the Panther/Vision Racing tandem that fields Carpenter’s No. 20 Dallara/ Honda backed by PGA golfer Fuzzy Zoeller’s Vodka.

Second on the rain-washed track was Will Power, whose 217.829MPH effort looked like a winner for Verizon Team Penske until Carpenter made his late-session run. Power, who leads the IZOD Series’ season points chase, starts ahead of points runner-up Dario Franchetti (-23 points) who drove his Target Ganassi Dixie Dallara into a disappointing eleventh starting spot. Dan Wheldon, coming off a strong run at Chicagoland for Panther Racing, will line up 3rd, with Scott Dixon’s Target Ganassi entry starting 4th.

Ryan Hunter-Reay was the only spin victim of the session, as his his Team IZOD Dallara spun into the fourth turn wall. His teammate Tony Kanaan who starts 26th, almost brushed the wall in his Andretti Autosport Team 7-Eleven mount, putting both team cars at the back of the field. Marco Andretti (15th) and Danica Patrick (17th) round out a rough weekend for Michael Andretti’s squad.

Paul Tracy, who rejoined the Dreyer & Reinbold team for this race and one later in the season in Japan, was a disappointing 23rd in his Motegi Racing Wheels/DRR mount.

Qualifying Friday for the Kentucky Indy 300 IZOD IndyCar Series event on the 1.48-mile Kentucky Speedway, with starting position, car number in parentheses, driver, chassis-engine, and speed
1. (20) Ed Carpenter, Dallara-Honda, 217.933
2. (12) Will Power, Dallara-Honda, 217.829
3. (4) Dan Wheldon, Dallara-Honda, 217.700
4. (9) Scott Dixon, Dallara-Honda, 217.533
5. (06) Hideki Mutoh, Dallara-Honda, 217.374
6. (34) Bertrand Baguette, Dallara-Honda, 216.988

7. (32) Mario Moraes, Dallara-Honda, 216.879
8. (3) Helio Castroneves, Dallara-Honda, 216.857

9. (6) Ryan Briscoe, Dallara-Honda, 216.600
10. (36) Tomas Scheckter, Dallara-Honda, 216.589
11. (10) Dario Franchitti, Dallara-Honda, 216.533
12. (14) Vitor Meira, Dallara-Honda, 216.434
13. (77) Alex Tagliani, Dallara-Honda, 216.391
14. (5) Takuma Sato, Dallara-Honda, 216.265
15. (26) Marco Andretti, Dallara-Honda, 216.173
16. (22) Justin Wilson, Dallara-Honda, 215.944
17. (7) Danica Patrick, Dallara-Honda, 215.820
18. (19) Alex Lloyd, Dallara-Honda, 215.272
19. (78) Simona de Silvestro, Dallara-Honda, 215.003
20. (2) Raphael Matos, Dallara-Honda, 214.948
21. (67) Sarah Fisher, Dallara-Honda, 214.813

22. (8) EJ Viso, Dallara-Honda, 214.595
23. (24) Paul Tracy, Dallara-Honda, 214.270
24. (18) Milka Duno, Dallara-Honda, 213.343
25. (66) Graham Rahal, Dallara-Honda, 212.364
26. (11) Tony Kanaan, Dallara-Honda, 210.831
27. (37) Ryan Hunter-Reay, Dallara-Honda, No speed

Paul Gohde

Paul Gohde heard the sound of race cars early in his life.

Growing up in suburban Milwaukee, just north of Wisconsin State Fair Park in the 1950’s, Paul had no idea what “that noise” was all about that he heard several times a year. Finally, through prodding by friends of his parents, he was taken to several Thursday night modified stock car races on the old quarter-mile dirt track that was in the infield of the one-mile oval -and he was hooked.

The first Milwaukee Mile event that he attended was the 1959 Rex Mays Classic won by Johnny Thomson in the pink Racing Associates lay-down Offy built by the legendary Lujie Lesovsky. After the 100-miler Gohde got the winner’s autograph in the pits, something he couldn’t do when he saw Hank Aaron hit a home run at County Stadium, and, again, he was hooked.

Paul began attending the Indianapolis 500 in 1961, and saw A. J. Foyt’s first Indy win. He began covering races in 1965 for Racing Wheels newspaper in Vancouver, WA as a reporter/photographer and his first credentialed race was Jim Clark’s historic Indy win.Paul has also done reporting, columns and photography for Midwest Racing News since the mid-sixties, with the 1967 Hoosier 100 being his first big race to report for them.

He is a retired middle-grade teacher, an avid collector of vintage racing memorabilia, and a tour guide at Miller Park. Paul loves to explore abandoned race tracks both here and in Europe, with the Brooklands track in Weybridge England being his favorite. Married to Paula, they have three adult children and two cats.

Paul loves the diversity of all types of racing, “a factor that got me hooked in the first place.”

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