Josef Newgarden continued his impressive rookie run Saturday at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, qualifying seventh for Honda-powered Sarah Fisher Hartman Racing in his first Indianapolis 500. After heading the time sheets during three of the seven practice days leading up to today’s Pole Day qualifying, Newgarden was the fastest of 12 Honda-powered qualifiers for the 96th running of the Indianapolis 500.

Sharing the third row with Newgarden will be the KV Racing Technology entries of veterans Tony Kanaan and E.J. Viso. Both Kanaan and Viso made the “Fast Nine” with their opening segment qualifying runs, but elected not to take part in the final pole shootout. As a result, they were placed eighth and ninth, respectively, based on their first segment qualifying speeds.

Alex Tagliani, pole qualifier for last year’s “500,” was the second-fastest Honda qualifier today and will start 11th for Bryan Herta Autosport, just ahead of the Chip Ganassi Racing entry of Graham Rahal, who will start on the outside of the fourth row, 12th. The fifth row of the starting grid will include Charlie Kimball, in the middle of the row, 14th, with Scott Dixon on the outside in 15th.

Qualifying concludes Sunday with the traditional “Bump Day” qualifying to complete the 33-car field. Only three Honda-powered entries have yet to qualify: the A.J. Foyt Racing entries of Mike Conway and Wade Cunningham, who were both bumped from the top-24 qualifiers today; and the Sarah Fisher Hartman entry of rookie Bryan Clauson, who crashed without injury during his first qualifying attempt.

Continuous television coverage of final qualifying, beginning at 12 p.m. EDT, will be provided by the NBC Sports Network.

Josef Newgarden (#67 Sarah Fisher Hartman Racing Honda) qualified 7th for his first Indianapolis 500:

“Yeah, I’m happy. Our goal today was to make the ‘Fast Nine’ and that’s exactly what we achieved. Once we did that, there was no reason to risk the car any futher [with additional qualifying runs] especially in light of what happened to [teammate] Bryan [Clauson] in the other car. We have a great starting position for the race, and I’ve got to thank the team, who’ve done a fabulous job this whole week.”

IndyCar Series
Round 05: Indy500

Rank	Driver (Team)
1	Ryan Briscoe (Team Penske)
2	James Hinchcliffe (Andretti Autosport)
3	Ryan Hunter-Reay (Andretti Autosport)
4	Marco Andretti (Andretti Autosport)
5	Will Power (Team Penske)
6	Helio Castroneves (Team Penske)
7	Josef Newgarden-R (Sarah Fisher Hartman)
8	Tony Kanaan (KV Racing Technology)
9	E.J. Viso (KV Racing Technology)
10	Rubens Barrichello (KV Racing Technology)
11	Alex Tagliani (Bryan Herta Autosport)
12	Graham Rahal (Chip Ganassi Racing)
13	Ana Beatriz (Andretti Autosport)
14	Charlie Kimball (Chip Ganassi Racing)
15	Scott Dixon (Target Chip Ganassi)
16	Dario Franchitti (Target Chip Ganassi)
17	James Jakes (Dale Coyne Racing)
18	JR Hildebrand (Panther Racing)
19	Takuma Sato (Rahal Letterman Lanigan)
20	Townsend Bell (Schmidt Hamilton Racing)
21	Justin Wilson (Dale Coyne Racing)
22	Michel Jourdain (Rahal Letterman Lanigan)
23	Simon Pagenaud-R (Schmidt Hamilton Racing)
24	Sebastien Saavedra (Andretti Autosport)