Newton, Iowa ? Scott Dixon snared his first pole of the season Saturday during qualifying for the inaugural Iowa Corn Indy 250.

Given how tough passing is expected to be on Iowa’s brand new, Rusty Wallace-designed short oval, some think Dixon might not give the top spot back.

Dixon qualified for the top spot with a top speed of 182.360 mph, grabbing the seventh pole of his career and his first on a short oval since 2003.

Helio Castroneves (182.272) also earned a spot in the front row during Saturday’s qualifying, which saw the top five spots grabbed by five teams.

Points leader Dario Franchitti and Rahal Letterman’s Scott Sharp will make up the second row. Vision Racing’s Ed Carpenter earned his best starting post of the year, qualifying fifth.

“We knew we had a decent car going into qualifying. I don’t think we thought we had a car for the pole,” Dixon said. “Once I saw the first lap I was like, ‘Wow, this thing is definitely going pretty quick.”‘

The field will try to pass Dixon on a track that won’t make it easy. The new track, which is .875 of a mile with variable banking and strong grip, hasn’t played like a surface conducive to passing during testing and qualifying.

The track runs quick for such a short oval, meaning that drivers will be looking all day for the slightest bit of daylight to sneak to the inside.

That is, of course, if they even get such a chance.

“It’s possible, and I don’t think it’s out of the question,” said Castroneves of Dixon running wire-to-wire today. “The problem here is, you can run behind a guy, and you can get close, and you can even try to attempt (to pass), but normally to make the pass you need to get at least side-by-side. But as soon as you do that, because the radials of the turn are so sharp, that it’s kind of like track and field. The guy on the inside always has the advantage.”

The Speedway, 35 miles west of Des Moines, was built in 2006 with hopes of landing an IRL race to anchor its schedule. Wallace, who has a 10 percent stake in the track, even designed the track to accommodate an IndyCar race. Tony Kanaan landed in the seventh spot, with a lap time of 17.7307. Danica Patrick, who picked up a career-best finish when she placed third at Texas, will start 11th, behind Franchitti and Kanaan.