Kurt Busch on Fontana Cup pole

In the process he did even more damage to Dale Earnhardt Jr's hopes of making the Chase for the Nextel Cup.

Busch currently holds twelfth place in the championship standings, potentially the last position in the Chase, and is just ahead of Earnhardt, who still has a mathematical chance of getting into the top 12.

However, the Penske driver has boosted his chances of securing that last spot this weekend by turning a lap of 39.474 seconds at an average speed of 182.399 mph, which gave him his tenth Nextel Cup career pole.

"The car has been pretty good today but I didn't expect that lap," Busch said. "We thought we had a good top ten car in practice but some of the numbers weren't quite adding up.

"The team did everything that they could to balance it out and I drove it for what it was worth. We're just thinking big picture right now and this is just a blessing."

Jimmie Johnson, who had been fastest in practice, came just one thousandth of a second short of claiming pole for his home race, but will still start from the front row of the grid.

"The car has been awesome and we ended up a thousandth of a second from pole," Johnson said. "We certainly tried as hard as I could as other guys did and we just came a little bit short. But we've got a great race car. I'm really looking forward to Sunday's race."

Kasey Kahne carried some momentum from his good run at Bristol last week to put his Evernham Dodge third on the grid. The second Penske car of Ryan Newman, which sat on provisional pole for a while, will start alongside him on the second row of the grid.

Hendrick's Kyle Busch rounded up the top five, ahead of Elliot Sadler and Earnhardt Jr, who had a less than perfect lap in what is a crucial weekend for him and his team, as they hope to avoid the engine issues that first hit them in the spring race at this venue.

"Turns 1 and 2 were perfect, the car was great." Earnhardt said about his lap.

"I thought I did a good job through there. Turn 3 I cut the entrance a little bit short and got my apex too soon. The car was a little tight but I think I could've done a better job through there on my part... but we'll work toward our goal."

His teammate Martin Truex Jr will start alongside him on the fourth row of the grid, ahead of Denny Hamlin and Roush Fenway's Greg Biffle.

Jeff Gordon, who sat on pole here in February, was 16th, while Matt Kenseth will start from 36th as he tries to take another victory at the two mile oval where he won earlier this year both the Busch and Cup races.

The Red Bull Toyotas had their best combined qualifying result of the year, ending up on the ninth row of the grid for Sunday's race with Brian Vickers ahead of his teammate AJ Allmendinger, who benefited from some extra track time in Ganassi's Busch Series car earlier in the day.

"I think the biggest deal was getting in the Busch car earlier today," said Allmendinger. "This track is so hot and so slippery that I literally think if I would have gone out there in my Cup car that I wouldn't have made it. It just gives me confidence, just like being in the truck last weekend in Bristol. I just need laps."

Juan Pablo Montoya will start 42nd after being unable to set a time. He was the fifth car on the track but unfortunately for the Colombian the engine in his No 42 Big Red Dodge gave up while he was on his first qualifying lap.

"We just lost our engine," Montoya said. "In practice I came out of second gear leaving the pits and it over-revved. They checked it and thought it would be okay. I'm glad it actually blew up today and not in race day. [The car] was a lot better than in practice and I thought we had something there."

Scott Riggs, Ward Burton and Dale Jarrett were the three drivers who did not make the field for Sunday's race.

Pos  Driver             Make       Speed    Time
 1.  Kurt Busch         Dodge      182.398  39.474
 2.  Jimmie Johnson     Chevrolet  182.394  39.475  + 0.001
 3.  Kasey Kahne        Dodge      182.020  39.556  + 0.082
 4.  Ryan Newman        Dodge      181.415  39.688  + 0.214
 5.  Kyle Busch         Chevrolet  181.342  39.704  + 0.230
 6.  Elliott Sadler     Dodge      181.333  39.706  + 0.232
 7.  Dale Earnhardt Jr  Chevrolet  181.132  39.750  + 0.276
 8.  Martin Truex Jr    Chevrolet  180.818  39.819  + 0.345
 9.  Denny Hamlin       Chevrolet  180.805  39.822  + 0.348
10.  Greg Biffle        Ford       180.605  39.866  + 0.392
11.  Bobby Labonte      Dodge      180.596  39.868  + 0.394
12.  Kevin Harvick      Chevrolet  180.542  39.880  + 0.406
13.  Casey Mears        Chevrolet  180.542  39.880  + 0.406
14.  David Gilliland    Ford       180.533  39.882  + 0.408
15.  Jeff Burton        Chevrolet  180.338  39.925  + 0.451
16.  Jeff Gordon        Chevrolet  180.185  39.959  + 0.485
17.  Brian Vickers      Toyota     180.144  39.968  + 0.494
18.  A.J. Allmendinger  Toyota     180.085  39.981  + 0.507
19.  Carl Edwards       Ford       179.937  40.014  + 0.540
20.  Paul Menard        Chevrolet  179.856  40.032  + 0.558
21.  David Stremme      Dodge      179.721  40.062  + 0.588
22.  Tony Stewart       Chevrolet  179.502  40.111  + 0.637
23.  J.J. Yeley         Chevrolet  179.497  40.112  + 0.638
24.  Clint Bowyer       Chevrolet  179.417  40.130  + 0.656
25.  Michael Waltrip    Toyota     179.332  40.149  + 0.675
26.  Bill Elliott       Ford       179.305  40.155  + 0.681
27.  Jeremy Mayfield    Toyota     179.207  40.177  + 0.703
28.  David Reutimann    Toyota     179.202  40.178  + 0.704
29.  Joe Nemechek       Chevrolet  179.024  40.218  + 0.744
30.  Dave Blaney        Toyota     178.904  40.245  + 0.771
31.  Reed Sorenson      Dodge      178.824  40.263  + 0.789
32.  Jeff Green         Chevrolet  178.594  40.315  + 0.841
33.  David Ragan        Ford       178.576  40.319  + 0.845
34.  Tony Raines        Chevrolet  178.545  40.326  + 0.852
35.  Robby Gordon       Ford       178.372  40.365  + 0.891
36.  Matt Kenseth       Ford       178.297  40.382  + 0.908
37.  Ricky Rudd         Ford       178.258  40.391  + 0.917
38.  Jamie McMurray     Ford       178.024  40.444  + 0.970
39.  Kyle Petty         Dodge      176.796  40.725  + 1.251
40.  Aric Almirola      Chevrolet  175.204  41.095  + 1.621
41.  Johnny Sauter      Chevrolet  174.757  41.200  + 1.726
42.  Juan Montoya       Dodge      -
43.  John Andretti      Dodge      178.722  40.286  + 0.812

Did not qualify:

     Scott Riggs        Dodge      178.709  40.289  + 0.815
     Ward Burton        Chevrolet  177.993  40.451  + 0.977
     Dale Jarrett       Toyota     177.405  40.585  + 1.111