Ragan takes first Busch pole
Rookie David Ragan claimed his first Busch Series pole position on Thursday night in qualifying for the O'Reilly 300 at Texas Motor Speedway
Ragan, who has taken over the famous No. 6 Roush Fenway Ford driven for many years by veteran Mark Martin, set a blistering pace on his qualifying run to lap the 1.5-mile oval in 28.263 seconds at an average speed of 191.063 mph.
His lap was a massive 0.255 seconds faster than Carl Edward's 28.518 effort, which put the Busch Series points leader second on the starting grid for Saturday's race, making it an all-Ford front-row.
"That was probably a little faster than I wanted to go. What a great lap and just a lot of hard work on all the Busch guys," Ragan said.
"This is probably one of my favorite race tracks. I've got as many laps around this track as I do at Nashville or Kentucky.
"We've had two solid runs last year in the trucks here. I felt coming into this weekend if we could get a car handling well this could be one of our highlights for the year."
Two Hendrick cars will line up behind the two Roush Fenway drivers, with Kyle Busch in third and Casey Mears in fourth, his lap being nearly half a second slower then Ragan's.
Kasey Kahne, who won this same race two years ago, emergerd fifth and fastest among the Dodge Chargers, while Denny Hamlin, who returns to the series after a three-race absence, got sixth.
David Reutimann was able to carry some of the momentum from his second place finish at Nashville last week, qualifying seventh and fastest among the Toyotas, while Dave Blaney, usually the fastest Toyota qualifier, crashed during his run and will start 42nd thanks to his owner-points status.
Three-time event winner Mark Martin, who returns to make his second start of the year in the Busch Series, qualified eighth for his former team Roush Fenway, driving the No. 06 Ford.
Kevin Harvick, also a three-time event winner at Texas, qualified 23rd, driving his team's No. 33 entry rather than Richard Childress' No. 21 car, which lines up 30th driven by Timothy Peters.
Juan Pablo Montoya had a decent qualifying, taking 14th on the grid after struggling with the balance of his car earlier during practice.
"It's a little better but still not all that comfortable with the car," the Colombian said. "It's OK. From where we were in practice, it's good.
"I'm a lot more comfortable in the Cup car than the Busch car. These things have a shorter wheelbase. I haven't driven them for a while."
Pos Driver Make Speed Time 1. David Ragan Ford 191.062 28.263 2. Carl Edwards Ford 189.354 28.518 + 0.255 3. Kyle Busch Chevrolet 188.719 28.614 + 0.351 4. Casey Mears Chevrolet 187.872 28.743 + 0.480 5. Kasey Kahne Dodge 187.695 28.770 + 0.507 6. Denny Hamlin Chevrolet 187.552 28.792 + 0.529 7. David Reutimann Toyota 187.461 28.806 + 0.543 8. Mark Martin Ford 187.259 28.837 + 0.574 9. Jeff Burton Chevrolet 186.968 28.882 + 0.619 10. Matt Kenseth Ford 186.929 28.888 + 0.625 11. Jon Wood Ford 186.780 28.911 + 0.648 12. David Gilliland Ford 186.683 28.926 + 0.663 13. Greg Biffle Ford 186.677 28.927 + 0.664 14. Juan Montoya Dodge 186.567 28.944 + 0.681 15. Paul Menard Chevrolet 186.496 28.955 + 0.692 16. Stephen Leicht Ford 186.445 28.963 + 0.700 17. Steve Wallace Dodge 186.303 28.985 + 0.722 18. Kurt Busch Dodge 186.278 28.989 + 0.726 19. Ward Burton Ford 186.226 28.997 + 0.734 20. Shane Huffman Chevrolet 186.175 29.005 + 0.742 21. Jamie McMurray Ford 185.803 29.063 + 0.800 22. David Stremme Dodge 185.797 29.064 + 0.801 23. Kevin Harvick Chevrolet 185.771 29.068 + 0.805 24. Jason Leffler Toyota 185.363 29.132 + 0.869 25. Regan Smith Chevrolet 185.281 29.145 + 0.882 26. Bobby Hamilton Jr Ford 185.109 29.172 + 0.909 27. Kyle Krisiloff Ford 184.571 29.257 + 0.994 28. Brent Sherman Chevrolet 184.401 29.284 + 1.021 29. Marcos Ambrose Ford 183.842 29.373 + 1.110 30. Timothy Peters Chevrolet 183.499 29.428 + 1.165 31. Brad Keselowski Chevrolet 183.343 29.453 + 1.190 32. Mike Wallace Chevrolet 183.163 29.482 + 1.219 33. Bobby Labonte Chevrolet 182.599 29.573 + 1.310 34. Eric McClure Chevrolet 182.156 29.645 + 1.382 35. Johnny Sauter Chevrolet 181.684 29.722 + 1.459 36. Reed Sorenson Dodge 181.220 29.798 + 1.535 37. JJ Yeley Chevrolet 181.062 29.824 + 1.561 38. Justin Diercks Chevrolet 180.156 29.974 + 1.711 39. Brad Coleman Chevrolet 179.826 30.029 + 1.766 40. Stanton Barrett Chevrolet 178.873 30.189 + 1.926 41. Kevin Lepage Ford 178.601 30.235 + 1.972 42. Dave Blaney Toyota 43. Brett Rowe Chevrolet 175.439 30.780 + 2.517 Not qualified: 44. R.Richardson Ford 174.695 30.911 + 2.648
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