Bowyer on pole at Loudon

Bowyer is one of three drivers from Richard Childress Racing who are in the Chase for the Nextel Cup. He currently ranks twelfth in the points, which means he is at the back of those drivers fighting for the championship, but on Sunday he will lead his title rivals when the green flag waves.

"This is the time to shine and we've got to step our game up and that's stepping it up in the right direction right there," said Bowyer after claiming his second career pole and his second this year.

"We've run well here, I really enjoy this racetrack. I always run well here but I can never finish good here.

"Hopefully we can run good and get the finish and get our first win. We've got to get that monkey off our back and I can't think of a better time to do it, starting the Chase right here at New Hampshire."

The 28-year-old had been second fastest in practice, showing he would be a pole contender early on. He was among the later runners in qualifying and bumped Martin Truex Jr from pole position with a lap of 29.206 seconds, at an average speed of 130.312 mph around the 1-mile oval.

Bowyer is in his second full season of Nextel Cup competition and is the only driver of those in the Chase who has not been able to win a race yet. His best result so far has been a third place at Bristol a couple of weeks ago.

DEI's Martin Truex Jr, another Chase contender, will start alongside Bowyer on the front row of the grid. He matched his best qualifying effort of the year but wished he could have been on pole to get an entry into next year's Budweiser shootout.

"I'm real happy with our qualifying effort," said Truex, who ranks seventh in the Chase. "I wish we could get the pole, we've been second already this year and we really want to get in the Bud shootout.

It was a really good lap for us and I know we have a great race car for Sunday. Starting on the front will certainly help us."

Chase contenders monopolized the first two rows of the grid with Kurt Busch and Jimmie Johnson locking up the second row.

Busch benefited from the improving track conditions at the end of the session as did Bowyer, while Johnson the championship leader, backed up his pace from the morning practice where he had been fastest.

Ryan Newman, a two-time winner at this track, was the fastest of the non-Chasers and also the quickest Dodge runner in fifth. Beside him on the third row on Sunday will be Tony Stewart, another two-time winner, who currently ranks third in the Chase, 20 points behind Johnson.

Kevin Harvick was another Chase contender in the top ten, qualifying eighth. Just outside the top ten were Carl Edwards and Kyle Busch, who will start from the sixth row of the grid on Sunday, while Denny Hamlin, who won at this track in July, was 14th.

Former championship leader and three-time winner at New Hampshire Jeff Gordon, qualified 18th ahead of Dale Earnhardt Jr, while the winningest driver at the track, Jeff Burton, just managed a 23rd place. However he wasn't the lowest qualifier of the Chase contenders, as Matt Kenseth ended up down in 31st place.

Sam Hornish Jr, who had a promising practice session, was unable to translate his speed into qualifying and ended up 46th fastest out of 49 drivers, meaning he will have to wait to make his Nextel Cup race debut.

"We just made some changes from practice and were a little bit too loose," said Hornish. "We just couldn't get the car to come off the corner like it needed to. Just a little disappointed, but we'll try it again."

Boris Said, who is making his first Nextel Cup race for Gillett Evernham this weekend, was able to grab the last spot on the grid, thanks to the disqualification of John Andretti, who had been 26th fastest. His car was found to be too low in the front end during post-qualifying inspection.

Along with Hornish and Andretti, also Jeremy Mayfield, Michael Waltrip and Kevin Lepage failed to make the grid for Sunday's race once again.

Pos  Driver             Make       Speed    Time
 1.  Clint Bowyer       Chevrolet  130.412  29.206
 2.  Martin Truex Jr    Chevrolet  130.255  29.241  + 0.035
 3.  Kurt Busch         Dodge      130.011  29.296  + 0.090
 4.  Jimmie Johnson     Chevrolet  129.798  29.344  + 0.138
 5.  Ryan Newman        Dodge      129.723  29.361  + 0.155
 6.  Tony Stewart       Chevrolet  129.679  29.371  + 0.165
 7.  Elliott Sadler     Dodge      129.679  29.371  + 0.165
 8.  Kevin Harvick      Chevrolet  129.362  29.443  + 0.237
 9.  Greg Biffle        Ford       129.226  29.474  + 0.268
10.  Dave Blaney        Toyota     129.164  29.488  + 0.282
11.  Carl Edwards       Ford       129.024  29.520  + 0.314
12.  Kyle Busch         Chevrolet  129.024  29.520  + 0.314
13.  Reed Sorenson      Dodge      129.007  29.524  + 0.318
14.  Denny Hamlin       Chevrolet  128.946  29.538  + 0.332
15.  Casey Mears        Chevrolet  128.885  29.552  + 0.346
16.  Regan Smith        Chevrolet  128.859  29.558  + 0.352
17.  Paul Menard        Chevrolet  128.854  29.559  + 0.353
18.  Jeff Gordon        Chevrolet  128.828  29.565  + 0.359
19.  Dale Earnhardt Jr  Chevrolet  128.784  29.575  + 0.369
20.  David Reutimann    Toyota     128.776  29.577  + 0.371
21.  J.J. Yeley         Chevrolet  128.771  29.578  + 0.372
22.  Jamie McMurray     Ford       128.294  29.688  + 0.482
23.  Jeff Burton        Chevrolet  128.199  29.710  + 0.504
24.  Tony Raines        Chevrolet  128.191  29.712  + 0.506
25.  Kasey Kahne        Dodge      128.143  29.723  + 0.517
26.  Bobby Labonte      Dodge      128.087  29.736  + 0.530
27.  Kenny Wallace      Ford       128.014  29.753  + 0.547
28.  Ward Burton        Chevrolet  128.014  29.753  + 0.547
29.  Scott Riggs        Dodge      127.868  29.787  + 0.581
30.  Matt Kenseth       Ford       127.838  29.794  + 0.588
31.  Juan Montoya       Dodge      127.829  29.796  + 0.590
32.  David Stremme      Dodge      127.825  29.797  + 0.591
33.  Jeff Green         Chevrolet  127.791  29.805  + 0.599
34.  Ken Schrader       Ford       127.688  29.829  + 0.623
35.  David Gilliland    Ford       127.615  29.846  + 0.640
36.  Johnny Sauter      Chevrolet  127.525  29.867  + 0.661
37.  Joe Nemechek       Chevrolet  127.470  29.880  + 0.674
38.  David Ragan        Ford       127.155  29.954  + 0.748
39.  A.J. Allmendinger  Toyota     126.998  29.991  + 0.785
40.  Robby Gordon       Ford       126.960  30.000  + 0.794
41.  Kyle Petty         Dodge      126.960  30.000  + 0.794
42.  Brian Vickers      Toyota     126.812  30.035  + 0.829
43.  Boris Said         Dodge      126.744  30.051  + 0.845