Franchitti tops final practice in Sonoma

Franchitti

Dario Franchitti set up to break the track record in qualifications for the GoPro Grand Prix of Sonoma with a fast lap of 1 minute, 18.0988 seconds in the morning practice on the 2.385-mile, 12-turn road course.

It was the fastest lap through three 45-minute sessions.

Franchitti, who won at Sonoma Raceway in 2009 in the No. 10 Target Chip Ganassi Racing car, was .2554 of a second faster than Ryan Hunter-Reay in the 45-minute session. Sebastien Bourdais posted the third-fastest time (1:18.5513), while Scott Dixon (1:18.5643) was fourth and Justin Wilson (1:18.5695) was fifth.

The top 14 cars were separated by less than a second.

The three rounds of qualifying for the Verizon P1 Award commence at 5:30 p.m. (ET) with live Timing & Scoring and the IMS Radio Network broadcast on www.indycar.com and the INDYCAR 13 app.

Will Power set the track record of 1 minute, 17.2709 seconds in qualifying in 2012. NBC Sports Network will broadcast qualifications at 9 p.m. (ET) today and has the race broadcast at 4 p.m. Aug. 25.