Franchitti, coming off finishes of 13th and eighth that have allowed Scott Dixon to move within eight points in the IndyCar Series championship battle, will start at the front of the 18-car field in Sunday's Motorola Indy 300.

The Scotsman was fastest in single-lap qualifying on the 2.26-mile, 12-turn natural terrain road course with a time of 1 minute, 16.7017 seconds (107.167 mph). He was unable to improve on that in the Firestone Fast 6 _ a 10-minute European-style qualifying session for the six fastest drivers that followed, but it was easily fast enough to give him his fifth career pole.

Patrick, who is still looking for her first IndyCar win, was the only one of the six drivers to improve in the final session, leaping up from sixth with a lap of 1:17.1812 (107.325).

The runner-up finish matched her qualifying effort in July at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course.

"It's really great to see (Patrick) back on the front row again," Franchitti said. "I'll have to stop telling her all my secrets. But that was a really impressive job from her. Two front rows, I'm bloody impressed."

"The best thing I have going for me is trying to catch my teammates," she said, referring to Franchitti, Tony Kanaan and defending Infineon winner Marco Andretti. "They're incredibly good on the road courses and everywhere."

Kanaan was third at 1:17.1932 (107.263), followed by Helio Castroneves at 1:17.2608 (107.169), Dixon at 1:17.3379 (107.063) and Sam Hornish Jr. at 1:17.5858 (106.721).