After a half-hour practice session earlier in the afternoon was led by reigning Cooper Tires USF2000 Powered by Mazda champion Anthony Martin, 13 drivers took to the 14-Turn, 4.014-mile Road America road course just after 5:15pm to qualify for the first of two Pro Mazda Grand Prix of Road America Presented by Allied Building Products races.

Despite threatening skies, the track remained dry for the 20 minutes session and championship leader Victor Franzoni was able to score the bonus point for pole after an impressive lap of 2 minutes, 6.584 seconds. That lap was a stunning 1.3220 seconds ahead of Martin.

This is the sixth career Mazda Road To Indy presented Cooper Tire pole for Franzoni, who will be making his 50th MRTI start on Friday afternoon.

Carlos Cunha, who scored his first Pro Mazda podium at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway qualified in third, matching his best starting spot of the season.

The Brazilian will be joined on the front row by his Team Pelfrey teammate TJ Fischer.

Here are the complete qualifying results:

RANK CAR. NO. DRIVER TEAM TOP LAP GAP
1 23 Victor Franzoni Juncos Racing 2:06.584 –.—-
2 8 Anthony Martin Cape Motorsports 2:07.906 1.3220
3 81 Carlos Cunha Team Pelfrey 2:08.865 2.2819
4 82 TJ Fischer Team Pelfrey 2:09.772 3.1884
5 80 Nikita Lastochkin Team Pelfrey 2:09.902 3.3189
6 14 Sting Ray Robb World Speed Motorsports 2:11.343 4.7595
7 12 Kris Wright JDC Motorsports 2:12.168 5.5841
8 57 Bob Kaminsky Kaminsky Racing 2:12.308 5.7242
9 13 Bobby Eberle World Speed Motorsports 2:12.589 6.0050
10 60 Jeff Green Juncos Racing 2:13.657 7.0737
11 31 Brendan Puderbach FatBoy Racing 2:17.537 10.9537
12 6 Max Hanratty ArmsUp Motorsports 2:17.694 11.1101
13 83 Charles Finelli Fat Boy Racing 2:19.901 13.3172

Pro Mazda is back on track bright and early for their second qualifying session at 8:25am tomorrow morning, and the middle step of of the MRTI ladder will roll off for their first race of the weekend at 1:35pm on Friday. The drivers will then take part in an autograph session in the IndyCar Fan Village at 3:15pm.