Briefly: Mansell secures his place in Indy 500: Motor racing

Nigel Mansell played his qualifying options to near-perfection at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway yesterday to claim provisional fifth place on the grid for the Indy 500 on 29 May, writes Tony Toomey. After delays for rain, Mansell opted to surrender his allotted place in the qualifying queue to take his turn in his primary car a little later. He then watched Al Unser Jnr lay down four blistering laps in his Penske-Mercedes to claim provisional pole at an average of 228.1mph before braving the onset of another humid weather front to average 224.04mph. 'I'm just so happy that we got qualifying in,' Mansell said. Further rain delayed qualifying for the Penske- Mercedes of Emerson Fittipaldi and Paul Tracy, who needs to get clearance to drive today after his accident on Friday.