Mikhail Aleshin stormed to a maiden IndyCar pole at Pocono for the Schmidt-Peterson Motorsports team as the Honda-powered cars proved their oval pace around the ‘Tricky Triangle’.

Carlos Munoz was the second driver out and looked like a contender for pole with a pair of 219mph laps.

But 12th man on track Aleshin, who earlier in the day had topped the practice timesheets, soon deposed the Colombian as the first driver to set two 220mph laps.

His combined two-lap qualifying run of 1m21.6530s was good enough for pole by 0.1s from Josef Newgarden and Takuma Sato, who late in the session were the closest to stealing the Russian’s position.

The Honda powered Dallaras were the strongest on track claiming five of the top seven grid slots, despite Chevrolet’s dominance in the races so far this year.

Helio Castroneves was the other Dallara-Chevy to challenge the front, and his combined 1m21.8997s was good enough for fourth.

Munoz will line up alongside James Hinchcliffe on row three after a good qualifying session for the Schmidt pair.

A hasty rebuild following a practice shunt meant Juan Pablo Montoya’s Penske Dallara-Chevy was an amalgamation of parts from his team-mates’ cars, but he did well to qualify in 14th, one place behind championship leader Simon Pagenaud who was visibly struggling with the windy conditions.

Sebastien Bourdais and Scott Dixon were two of the big names to wrestle with poor grip and finished 18th and 19th respectively.

Pippa Mann, on her return to the series for the first time since the Indianapolis 500, struggled to match the pace and could only manage a pair of 211mph laps.

Last year’s Pocono winner Ryan Hunter-Reay also had a shunt in first practice, and the damage proved too insurmountable for his mechanics to get the car out in time for qualifying, meaning he will line up at the back.

QUALIFYING RESULTS

Aleshin takes maiden Indycar pole at Pocono