Wallace takes pole at Rockingham

Wallace scorched a new track record at "The Rock" - the one mile oval of North Carolina Speedway.

No less heartening to diehard Ford fans was a lap by new Yates' driver Ricky Rudd good enough for outside front row.

But Wallace was in his own time zone, touring the speedway in 23.167 seconds for a speed of 158.035 mph.

That was a full mile faster than Rudd and the rest of the field.

Unlike Daytona, the field appeared level for all three car makes as Bobby Labonte in his Pontiac and Dale Earnhardt's Chevrolet comprise the second row, followed by Jeff Gordon and rookies Matt Kenseth and Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Joe Nemechek, a resurgent Bill Elliott and veteran Darrell Waltrip round out the top ten.

Earnhardt [Sr] and Waltrip were lucky to even qualify in the first round last year.

But Waltrip, in his final year as an active driver - and Earnhardt competing against his son and a dismal pole record, pulled out the stops under sunny skies.

Perhaps an even bigger surprise was Mark Martin, defending champion and winner of pole qualifying for Saturday's Busch race.

A sick car left him 44th fastest of 47 trying.

Rockingham is a tyre-unfriendly, treacherous track and thus speed is only part of the equation in Sunday's Kmart 400 event, the first non-restricted carburetor race of the long season.

Wallace mastered this event in his 1993-94 salad days when he mustered a 10 and eight win season, respectively.

Prior to that, this was the track where Kyle Petty seemed to own the keys to Victory Lane.

He led the 1990 event from pole to pole, winning the largest pole bonus and payday to date in the rural sand hills of North Carolina.

Today he could only muster 13th fastest; not a bad number compared to Daytona 500 winner/polesitter Dale Jarrett who was good enough for 23rd place.

Qualifying for the remainder of the 43-car field is set for Saturday.