Qualifying: Craven trumps Elliott for pole

Craven, the last man to make a qualification attempt Friday afternoon, knocked Elliott off the pole with a lap at 188.127mph in a Ford Taurus. That bettered Elliott's lap of 187.857mph, set earlier in the session in a Dodge Intrepid.

"I love a good game of Poker and you never count your money," said Craven. "In this case, if we surprised a few people, then great. We may have surprised ourselves a little bit, but we knew we had the ability to do it. Now, we need to close strong and show some muscle."

Craven had targeted this race as a chance to display just how much his team has improved.

"I said last week I couldn't wait to get to Michigan," Craven said. "I've run well here, I've led laps, I've qualified in the top-five before. I just felt like this was a place where we could turn the corner. Actually, the last month we have really run well. Every week, we keep getting the car better and better.

"We brought a brand-new Ford here and didn't know what to expect. Qualifying was about perfect. I knew we had a shot. We were the last car out and that gave us time to tune the engine up. I enjoy working with this team and life is good."

It was Craven's fourth career Winston Cup pole in 167 NASCAR Winston Cup races. It was his first-ever pole at the two-mile Michigan International Speedway. What made Craven's pole qualifying speed so impressive is he was just 24th quickest in practice at 184.743 mph.

"I thought Ricky Rudd would be the one to knock me off the pole," said Elliott. "You never know because week-in and week-out, everybody has good equipment and Craven's car has Robert Yates' motors. When you hit the combination just right, everyone has the potential to do it.

"We're on the pole, we're just on the wrong side of it. I've been in racing long enough to know that qualifying is over and we'll worry about the race on Sunday. That is the main objective now, to run well on Sunday. We gained some from our last race here and we came back and we are better than before."

Rudd will start third on Sunday after running a lap at 187.534 mph in a Ford Taurus. Rudd enters the race 194 points behind Winston Cup leader Jeff Gordon.

"We were close entering the Brickyard 400 and now there is a big gap," said Rudd. "We broke and Jeff Gordon didn't. We have a long way to go and if we have to race each other the rest of the year, we won't beat him based on just catching up. But with 13 races to go, Jeff will have trouble and Dale Jarrett will have trouble and I will have trouble. Whoever has the least amount of trouble will win the championship.

"Plus, Jeff has been outrunning us every week. The big points losers and the big points gainers will be because someone has trouble."

Elliott Sadler qualified fourth in a Ford at 187.217 mph with John Andretti rounding out the top five in a Dodge at 187.164 mph.

Winston Cup points leader Jeff Gordon will start 13th with a lap at 186.591 mph in a Chevrolet.

Craven drives for team owner Cal Wells, who has experienced a great deal of upheaval and uncertainty on his two-car team this year. Andy Houston is the team's other driver and has struggled this season. That has led that team's sponsor, McDonald's, to serve notice that it will not be back to sponsor the team next year. Wells has released many of the crew members on that team.

Craven said the team made some big changes to the car from the middle of Friday's practice until he went out as the last car to make a qualification attempt.

"They made some great changes," Craven said. "I knew the car was fast, it just got away from me on the practice run. Running on new tyres was at a premium here and you had to make sure you had a full supply of sticker [new] tyres."

Craven's career appeared to be on a downward spiral after he crashed at Texas Motor Speedway in 1998 when he was still competing for Hendrick Motorsports as driver of the Budweiser Chevrolet. A year later, Craven was diagnosed with post-concussion syndrome, which led him to climb out of the race car before spring race at Darlington, South Carolina.

After that, few teams in Winston Cup racing would give Craven a chance. It was almost as if he was blacklisted from the sport. But he found an opportunity with Hal Hicks' Midwest Transit Team last year and did well in the races that the team participated in.

Craven's big break came in January when Wells decided to release Scott Pruett and replace him with Craven.

"If I were to campaign, I'm 35 years old and the next five years will be the best of my career," Craven said. "I have great health, I have more experience than I have five years ago. Thanks to Cal and thanks to Tide, I've been given that opportunity. This team just needs to stick together for a long time. I believe in what we have, we just have to leave it alone and let it grow.

"A year ago, I was floating around Moose Head Lake in Northern Maine with my wife and two kids. I didn't want anybody to feel sorry for me because it was the greatest time in my life. I wish I had been racing every week, but if I weren't racing that 50 [Midwest Transit] car, I wouldn't go near the TV because it was too aggravating.

"So I would hop in the boat with the kids and do things that John Andretti and Jeff Burton wish they could be doing. As bad as it was that I wasn't in a race car, personally, my life was very good, so I made a positive out of it."

For full qualifying results, click here.


David Keith, Ford, 38.985s, 184.686mph
Buckshot Jones, Dodge, 38.998s, 184.625mph
Jean-Michael Vincent, Airwolf, 39.843s, 183.799mph