Michael Waltrip won the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series Bud Pole for the Pocono 500, lapping Pocono Raceway in 53.238 seconds at 169.052 mph. Kasey Kahne holds the track-qualifying record of 52.164 seconds, 172.533 mph, set June 11, 2004.
This is Waltrips third career Bud Pole in 620 NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series races. His most recent Bud Pole came at Michigan in June 1991, 457 races ago.
Waltrip has posted just five top-10 starts in 39 races at Pocono.
This is Waltrips second start better than 18th this season. He started third for the Daytona 500.
Waltrip became the ninth different Bud Pole winner this season. He is the 17th different Bud Pole winner in the past 18 races at Pocono. Qualifying was canceled in June 2002.
Kurt Busch posted the second-quickest qualifying lap of 53.356 seconds, 168.678 mph and will join Waltrip on the front row for the Pocono 500. Busch has started from a top-10 starting position in four of his nine races at Pocono. This is his seventh top-10 start this season and his second time to post the second-quickest qualifying lap.
This is the fifth Bud Pole for Chevrolet in 2005 [five different drivers]. Dodge has six Bud Poles and Ford has two. Qualifying was canceled at Dover.
Brian Vickers (third) posted his fifth top-10 start this season. He has started sixth or better in all three of his races at Pocono.
Jamie McMurray (fourth) posted his second top-10 start in his fifth Pocono race. He started seventh in August 2004. It is his second top-10 start this season and his first in timed qualifying. He started ninth last week when qualifying was canceled.
Scott Riggs (fifth) posted his first start better than 26th in his three Pocono races. It is his fourth top-10 start this season all top-fives.
Ryan Newman (17th) failed to post a top-10 start for the first time this season and ended a streak of 20 consecutive top-10 starts. It is just his second start outside the top-15 in his seven races at Pocono.
Jeff Gordon (31st) posted his worst ever qualifying effort at Pocono and just his fourth start outside the top-20 in his 25 races here.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. (34th) has posted just one top-10 start this season: fifth in the Daytona 500. After 14 races in 2004, he had started from the top-10 ten times.
Four drivers failed to qualify for the Pocono 500: Kirk Shelmerdine, P.J. Jones, Hermie Sadler and Carl Long.
Only five of the 47 drivers took both laps allocated for their qualifying effort.
The farthest back that a race winner at Pocono has started was 27th by Terry Labonte in the 1995 Pocono 500 [remeber when Gordon missed the shift].(NASCAR Statistical Services)(6-11-2005)
