Green sets Dover record in Busch qualifying

DOVER, Del. (AP) -- David Green drove an untested car to a NASCAR Busch series qualifying record for Dover International Speedway, winning his first Busch Pole of the season Friday.

Green hustled his Chevrolet around The Monster Mile at 157.916 mph. That easily surpassed Joe Nemechek's year-old Busch record of 156.747 on the high-banked concrete oval.

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The pole run was the 22nd for Green, the 1994 series champion. He'll seek his ninth career victory Saturday in the MBNA 200.

"We brought a brand new Monte Carlo here for the first time," he said. "The car had not been on a track until 9 o'clock this morning."

He knocked Brewco Motorsports teammate Johnny Sauter off the pole.

"When I saw Johnny go to the top two cars ahead of me, I knew I had to dig," Green said. "I just wanted to make it an all-Brewco front row."

The team began the season with Pontiacs, which no longer race on the NASCAR circuit. Both Green and Sauter considered that a setback.

"Today shows that we're making progress," Green said. "If we could have snapped our fingers during the offseason we would have done it."

Dover has not been kind to Green, winless here in 20 starts.

Sauter got around at 157.846. He also has been less than spectacular at Dover, with a best previous start of 24th and finish of 16th in four races.

"Dover's one of the racetracks I've had a lot of bad luck at," Sauter said. "But we were fast right off the truck.

"I'm really optimistic because I have a car that's capable of winning the race."

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Jason Leffler made it a Chevy sweep of the top three spots with a run of 157.522. But he was less than satisfied with his lap.

"We dragged the racetrack pretty bad," he said. "We bottomed out a couple of times, and that hurt our speed."

But Leffler was confident about Saturday.

"We did a lot of race runs in practice and we're looking forward to it," he said.

Nextel Cup rookie Kasey Kahne was fourth-fastest, going 157.398 in a Dodge. He was followed by Ron Hornaday, whose Chevy completed a lap at 157.377.

Bobby Hamilton Jr. was next in a Ford at 157.288. Qualifying seventh for the $1 million race was Nextel Cup regular Greg Biffle, whose fast lap in a Ford was 157.281.

Jason Keller, Martin Truex Jr. and Nemechek completed the top 10. All broke the previous track record, as did Justin Labonte, Tony Raines and Kevin Harvick.

Points leader Kyle Busch qualified 14th.