Marc Marquez took a last-gasp pole position for the Moto2 Indianapolis by the smallest of margins from Simone Corsi in a thrilling qualifying session, while championship leader Stefan Bradl endured a disastrous afternoon.
Corsi was the first man to pump in a really quick time in 1m44.259s with six minutes to go, but the Ioda Racing FTR rider was knocked back by the Team Catalunya Suter of Marquez two minutes later.
Both riders made one final attempt to secure the top spot as the chequered flag flew, with Corsi taking the top spot after picking up a tow from three bikes ahead of him down the start/finish straight. But his joy turned to disappointment seconds later as Marquez's 1m44.038s lap knocked him from pole by just a thousandth of a second.
While Marquez took his fourth consecutive pole and his fifth of the season, second marked Corsi's best starting spot in Moto2.
Behind them Andrea Iannone took his best grid spot of the year in third on his Speed Master Suter while Britain's Bradley Smith was fourth for Tech 3 as three different chassis manufacturers appeared in the top four positions.
Thomas Luthi recovered from an early crash to leap up 10 places to fifth on his final lap and edge his Interwetten Suter just ahead of Mattia Pasini, who secured his own career-best performance in Moto2 on the second Ioda bike.
Pol Espargaro was a fine seventh on his Speed Up FTR while Dominique Aegerter (Technomag Suter), Esteve Rabat (Blusens FTR) and Alex de Angelis (JIR Motobi) completed the top 10.
Britain's Scott Redding briefly held pole with seven minutes to go, but the Marc VDS Suter man was bumped back to 11th by the end.
Championship leader Bradl was never in contention and will start the race from 22nd place. Chief among the Kiefer Racing rider's problems is that the Kalex chassis is not suited to the Indianapolis track - a point proven by Aleix Espargaro taking the best starting spot for a similar bike in 17th.