Sevenoaks’ Mike Conway will start Saturday’s Chevrolet Indy Dual race in Detroit from second on the grid.

It is an impressive achievement considering the 29-year-old hasn’t raced an Indy Car since Long Beach in April, yet he still managed to put the Dale Coyne Racing machine on the front row, underlining the natural talent that he has.

It is even more impressive given that Conway only had practice yesterday morning to get used to the set-up of the No. 18 Sonny’s BBQ car, and the 13 turn street circuit.

Yet he showed the car had pace by finishing sixth in the practice session and that placed him in group two for the first round of qualifying. With wet track conditions, Conway showed his quality by laying down a quick lap time in the wet before as the track dried out setting the third quickest time. This meant that he moved into the Firestone Fast Six.

He posted an impressive time of 79.8285 seconds and led the session for most of the way, until he dropped to third, however with Dario Franchitti being relegated ten places on the grid, it means that Conway starts today’s race from second on the grid.

Speaking after qualifying a pleased Conway, said: “It was obviously a bit dryer in our session. The tyres started to go pretty quick. So obviously one lap, and then you try to back off and cool the tyres down and go for another one and that was enough to put me through.

“Obviously the other two (segments) after that were still tricky. The drying conditions at the end there beat the tyres up pretty hard. I think we went out maybe a little too early, but to be third and straight back in the car again is good. Obviously a good starting position for the race.”