Kenseth wins pole for Banquet 400

KANSAS CITY, Kan. -- Matt Kenseth set a track qualifying record in capturing the pole for the Banquet 400, hoping it will put him in position to win today and get back into the race for the Chase for the Nextel Cup championship.

Kenseth is seventh in the standings, 111 points behind leader Tony Stewart. The last time Kenseth won a pole, he took the checkered flag, too. Now he'd like more of the same at the 1 1/2-mile tri-oval at Kansas Speedway.

The 2003 Winston Cup champion, whose uneventful title run led NASCAR to overhaul its title format, recorded his only victory this year on Aug. 26 at Bristol. This is his third career pole.

"We had a good car lately, and it's been a lot of fun to drive them," said Kenseth, who turned in a lap of 180.856 mph in his Ford on Saturday. "We haven't had good cars until last couple of months."

The top five qualifiers all broke Jimmie Johnson's track record of 180.373 mph, set in 2003 -- but no other title contenders made it into the first two rows, and only half of the Chase field will start in the top 10.

Carl Edwards, sixth in the standings, will start fifth on Sunday. Greg Biffle, sitting fifth, will start eight. Stewart will start ninth, and defending champion Kurt Busch -- 10th in the standings and all but out of contention to repeat -- qualified 10th.

Edwards, who won a Craftsman Truck Series race here last year, said he took a conservative approach to qualifying after seeing Kasey Kahne and Denny Hamlin crash.

"The pole is great and all that," Edwards said, "but the car is so good it would have been foolish to come out here in cool temperatures ... and lay it on the line the first lap and have a wreck."

Ryan Newman, who trails Stewart by only 4 points, will start 11th. Jeremy Mayfield, eighth in the standings, qualified 14th, with ninth-place Mark Martin starting 19th.

Third-place Rusty Wallace will have the most ground to make up Sunday after qualifying 33rd in the 43-car field.

Two drivers chasing 11th place, and the $1 million bonus that goes with it, qualified second and third. Elliott Sadler, the first to break Johnson's record Saturday, will start on the outside front after running a quick lap of 180.717 mph in his Ford. Jeff Gordon, winner of the first two Cup races here, had a quick lap of 180.469 mph in his Chevrolet and will start third.

"The track was pretty tricky for qualifying, because the temperatures are cool and the tires had a lot of grip," Gordon said. "We had a great run, but in order to get on the pole you have to have the car a lot tighter than we had it."

Scott Wimmer qualified fourth, followed by Edwards, Kevin Lepage, Denny Hamlin, Biffle, Stewart and Busch.

Defending race winner Joe Nemechek, who swept the Busch and Nextel Cup races here last year, qualified 16th for the race.