Hanging With Right Crowd

Tony Kanaan, in the thick of a five-way battle for the Indy Racing League championship, was fastest in practice Friday for Sunday’s Toyota Indy 400 at California Speedway, and three of the four other contenders were close behind.

Between him and them, though, ran -- surprise! -- Ontario native Roger Yasukawa, a rookie who has never finished in the top five.

On a hot, wind-gusting day in Fontana, Kanaan, third in the standings, only 14 points behind leader Helio Castroneves, turned a fast lap of 224.833 mph around the 2-mile D-shaped oval in his Andretti Green Dallara-Honda.

Just off that pace, in the Dallara-Honda he drives for Super Aguri Fernandez Racing, Yasukawa ran at 224.629.

Although he has no shot at the title -- he’s 184 points out of first place -- Yasukawa is a leading candidate for rookie of the year. As such, he vowed not to back down Sunday if he found himself running with the title seekers, who have the race here, then the finale next month at Texas Motor Speedway.

“You’ve got to go into any race thinking you’re going to win,” Yasukawa said. “When you’re racing, you’ve got to be fair and race clean with everyone. That doesn’t mean that if I’m leading, I’m going to let everyone else go by me just because they’re fighting for the championship.

“We’ve been very strong on the superspeedways lately, and for me, winning the rookie-of-the-year title is going to be the biggest thing.”

Scott Dixon, second in the standings, was third-fastest at 224.405 in Chip Ganassi’s G Force-Toyota; Castroneves was next at 224.324 in Roger Penske’s Dallara-Toyota, followed by Sam Hornish Jr. at 224.321 in his Panther Racing Dallara-Chevrolet.

Hornish, who jumped 40 points in the standings by winning two weeks ago at Joliet, Ill., ranks fifth, 24 points behind Castroneves.

Only Gil de Ferran, fourth among the top five, was out of the 224-mph range, and he had at least a partial excuse: a switch in cars.

De Ferran, Castroneves’ Penske teammate, ran the first two races this season in a Dallara chassis. He switched to a G Force at Indianapolis and won the 500, stayed in the car for a June race at Fort Worth, then was back in the Dallara for the next nine events. Here, he’s running the G Force again.

“We’ve been working on the race setup all day,” he said.

Qualifying for Sunday’s race will start at 11 today and, with the same kind of weather expected, could yield some more surprises.

Kanaan, though, said qualifying here was not nearly as crucial as at some other tracks, since the track is fast and wide enough for pack racing.

“It doesn’t matter where you qualify,” he said. “This is going to be a tight race. It doesn’t matter where you start. Concentrate on race setup and see what happens on Sunday. I’m not even worried about [today] and qualifying at all. I just want to be up front, obviously, to try and stay out of trouble.”

Unable to avoid trouble Friday was Valencia driver Bryan Herta, Kanaan’s teammate. Herta’s Dallara-Honda hit the outside wall in Turn 2 during the first practice session. He escaped injury, but the car was damaged in the rear. “It was a difficult day for us all around,” Herta said.

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Season leader Brendan Gaughan won the pole for today’s NASCAR Craftsman Truck series race, the American Racing Wheels 200.

Gaughan, a four-time winner this season, qualified at 173.716 mph in his Dodge pickup, beating out Rick Crawford, who ran 173.632 in a Ford.

“We’ve been waiting for this West Coast stretch,” Gaughan said. “We thought if we came through the summer months good, we would get this little run and might be able to do something. We ran here a bunch in Winston West cars and I’ve always liked this track.”

Rookie Carl Edwards qualified third at 173.248 in a Ford.

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Rookie Mark Taylor won his fourth pole of the season in the Infiniti Pro series, the IRL’s development series. Taylor, who has won races at Phoenix and Nashville, qualified at 188.472 mph. Ed Carpenter qualified second at 188.459, Aaron Fike third at 188.013. All drove Infiniti-powered Dallaras.