Kurt Busch leads ho-hum qualifying night by Chasers

For once, all the attention fell on someone other than points leader Jeff Gordon and chief rival Jimmie Johnson, as Greg Biffle took the pole for Sunday's Pep Boys Auto 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

Of course, Kurt Busch had something to do with that too, as he out-qualified both the Chase leader and the runner-up.

In a unique twist just five days before Halloween, the 12 Chasers' qualifying laps were separated by a total of .666 seconds.

Busch led the way among the Chasers, putting the No. 2 Dodge second on the grid with a lap at 28.811 seconds, 192.426 mph. That was just .004 seconds off Biffle's pole time.

Busch should run very well at Atlanta, but for some reason it hasn't shown up on paper. In 13 starts, he has a victory in 2002, which is also his lone top-five finish, and two more top-10s to go along with it. His average finish is 22.3, ninth-best of the Chase competitors.

Johnson was next in the Chase, putting No. 48 Chevrolet in the sixth spot with a lap at 28.996 seconds, 191.199 mph. Johnson is pretty good at Atlanta, historically, notching two victories, seven top-five and eight top-10 finishes in just 12 starts. His average finish is 10.083, second-best in the Chase, and he's "just" 712 laps behind Gordon in laps led.

Gordon is never very far from the front, and he put the No. 24 Chevy in eighth at 29.069 seconds, 190.719 mph. Gordon is, as on most weekends, the leading winner among Chase drivers at Atlanta with four. In 30 starts, Gordon has 12 top-five and 18 top-10 finishes against only five DNFs, and the last time he won here was in this race back in 2003.

Gordon also leads the Chase in laps led at Atlanta with 1,050 (1,575 miles on the 1.5-mile configuration, 1,617 on the 1.54-mile configuration), and his average finish of 13.3 is fourth-best in the Chase.

After Gordon, five Chasers anchored the last five spots in the top 20.

Carl Edwards was 15th in the No. 99 Ford, running a lap at 29.207 seconds, 189.818 mph. Edwards earned his first two victories at Atlanta, sweeping the 2005 races there, and he's hoping for a return to Victory Lane, if for no other reason than to take people's minds off the post-race dust-up with Matt Kenseth at Martinsville.

In six Atlanta starts, Edwards has two victories, three top-five and five top-10 finishes. His stat line is unique: he has finished first twice and seventh twice alongside a third-place run in his 2004 debut and a 40th-place result in the spring of 2006. His average finish is a Chase-best 9.8, the only Chaser in single digits.

One row behind on the inside came Matt Kenseth, with whom Edwards got up-close and personal after Martinsville last week. Kenseth put the No. 17 Ford in 17th, running exactly the same lap as Edwards, only later in the session.

Kenseth has never won at Atlanta, but he's almost a mortal lock for the top 10. In 15 starts, Kenseth has five top-five and eight top-10 finishes, the best of which was a third-place run there in March. His average is a chipper 15.6, fifth among Chasers. He also has three DNFs. (Continued)