Dale Earnhardt Jr. will line up 10th Sunday, while Jeff Gordon will start fifth. Credit: Autostock

Chase contenders start 'Dega off on right foot

ATLANTA -- When you're racing at Talladega, the best place to be is in front. That means qualifying well.

In a broad sense, there are effectively two races when NASCAR visits Alabama: one for starting position and another for the money. For most of the 10 drivers in the Chase for the Nextel Cup, they did well enough in the former Friday to have a chance at the latter Sunday. Better yet, the odds that the top 10 will miss the inevitable mess are greatly improved.

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All but one of the top 10 made it into the top 20 starting positions for Sunday's EA Sports 500.

Jeff Gordon, the point leader entering the event, led the way for the Chasers, qualifying fifth. By far the best of the Chasers in terms of performance in races at the big 2.66-mile oval with three victories and 11 top-five finishes, Gordon also has 12 top-10 starts. He does not, however, have a pole here. His average start at Talladega is 11.9, so he did very well indeed. Gordon was fourth behind eventual pole winner Joe Nemechek, Scott Riggs and Kurt Busch in Friday's practice session.

Matt Kenseth

Elliott Sadler, who has bitter and blurry memories of last year's fall race at Talladega when he barrel-rolled down the backstretch and into Turn 3 late in the race, shook it off and wound up sixth. Though he has a Bud Pole here and one more top-five start, once the race gets going, Talladega has been a house of horrors for Sadler. His average finish is 28.3, and his best here is third in last year's spring race. He backed up his sixth-place practice time, however.

One of the bigger surprises was Matt Kenseth in seventh. The 2003 series champion has the worst average starting spot here at 31.3, but he was 12th after practice and wound up seventh in the starting order. His average finish, however, is 19.8, which gives him a good shot at making up for the wet and wild ride he took last week at Dover. His best career finish here is fourth in 2001, and he has three top-10 finishes. One of those would go a long way to repairing some of the points damage he sustained a week ago.

Busch slipped a little from his practice position, coming home eighth for Sunday's race. Busch traditionally doesn't qualify well here, averaging a 24.6 starting position, but he tends to race well, logging three top-five and four top-10 finishes on the monster layout.

Jeremy Mayfield, who has won a pole at Talladega, hasn't quite figured out the secret of starting well here. He will roll off ninth on Sunday, one spot worse than his practice ranking, but his average start here is 24.7, and his average finish just 23.3.

Jimmie Johnson

Dale Earnhardt Jr., master of the restrictor plate speedways, was 10th in qualifying after practicing 11th. That's just about right for the Bud Man, whose average start here is 11.7. When the green flag waves on Sunday, Earnhardt has been just super. He has six top-two finishes in the last six races and finished eighth in the race before. It doesn't seem to matter where he starts. He started 38th in last year's fall event and wound up second, a tick behind teammate Michael Waltrip.

Jimmie Johnson, who has the best average starting spot of all the Chasers at 4.0, wound up 16th in the lineup after practicing an abnormal 24th. He has two poles here, and until Friday had never started worse than eighth. In the races, he has two top-10 finishes and a top-five (fourth). However, he and Gordon found a way to blunt the DEI machine in recent plate races, so count on them to be a factor once it's all for-real on Sunday.

Just as surprising as Kenseth's surge was that of Mark Martin, who languished in 41st after the morning practice run. Martin rebounded to rest 17th. He picked up nearly three miles per hour (2.836, to be exact) between practice. The sentimental favorite in this inaugural Chase for the Nextel Cup, Martin has traditionally started well here (average 13.7) and finished even better. In 37 starts, he has 21 top-10 finishes and 18 starts in the top 10. Besides Gordon and Earnhardt, Martin is the only other Chase driver to have won here, and he will likely be a threat on Sunday.

Ryan Newman

Ryan Newman wound up 19th in the lineup after practicing 10th. One of the tracks where he does not have a pole, Talladega has been a puzzle for Newman. His average start of 10.4 is second only to Johnson, but his finishes have been more pedestrian. His best was a fourth in this race last year, and his average finish is 20.8. He has two top-10 finishes in five races.

The Chase has become the Quest for Tony Stewart, who has been behind the eight ball since the first race at New Hampshire. Stewart practiced a respectable 20th, but fell off to 30th in qualifying. He was the last of the Chasers to go out, and by the time he did, times had fallen off. He even picked up from practice by a smidgen, but it was not enough to crack the top 20. However, he's better once the race gets going.

In 11 races here, Stewart has averaged 17.9 for a starting position, including five in the top 10, but his average finish is 14.2. He has top-10 finishes in six of those races. At Talladega, it all depends on where you end up, not where you start.