LAS VEGAS -- In many aspects, Las Vegas Motor Speedway is the first true test of the young season -- a 1.5-mile track that will allow teams to gauge their setups on those intermediate layouts that comprise the greatest portion of the schedule.

Carl Edwards thus far has had good cars; he finished second in the Daytona 500 and in his opinion had the winning car last week at Phoenix, if it hadn't spent 60 laps in the garage for repairs to damage sustained in an early race incident. Whether he would have won we will never know. But he says there's a bigger unknown this week.

"Every time you come to that first mile-and-a-half race of the season it means a lot," Edwards said Friday shortly after posting the fourth-fastest time in the first Sprint Cup Series practice of the race weekend. "The real test is how we run here ... If our cars are that good then this is going to be a great year."

While the disappointment of Phoenix lingers -- the accident dropped him to 12th in points -- unloading fast at Vegas is a step in the right direction.

"I would have loved to come in here the points leader with a win already, but this helps, being fast," Edwards said. "The Roush Fenway [Racing] cars are fast. I feel like we have the cars, at least at this point right now, that can compete for the win."

All four of Roush Fenway's cars were in the top five in speeds in opening practice. Running fast at Vegas has become the norm for the organization, which leads all teams with six Cup victories and 14 wins across the three national series. Jack Roush looks forward to seeing how his team measures up.

"It's the second non-restricted race and we like to think we are more in control of what happens on the race track and being able to orchestrate a good outcome based on strategy, the quality of work in the shop and the quality of people behind the program," Roush said. "We still think that one of our team strengths -- after two decades -- is our performance at the mile-and-a-half race tracks."

Ford cars swept the first two rows in qualifying, all with Roush Yates Engines providing the horsepower. Three of those cars belonged to Roush Fenway, with Matt Kenseth on the pole after setting a track record and Edwards and Greg Biffle on Row 2. Edwards ran a lap of 28.704 seconds (188.127 mph).

"That lap was fast. I couldn't tell exactly how fast it was while I was out there because we picked up so much. Right now we are seeing speeds that no one could touch in practice," said Edwards, who will make his second top-10 start at Vegas. The first one came in 2008; he started second and won the race.

What Roush doesn't have control of is the early-season -- and early-race -- aggressiveness on the track. It took out the longtime owner's best chance of a victory last week when the pole-sitting Edwards ran into trouble after Kyle Busch initiated contact.

"The racing is as intense as ever," Edwards said. "What happened last week, looking back on it, that is just hard racing and I really believe that is behind us. Hopefully we can stay out of those messes throughout the year and have fast enough cars that that one [wreck] doesn't really matter."

Edwards thinks Vegas lends itself to a similar style of racing we have seen thus far.

"The higher speeds here are going to make it more treacherous to run side by side," he said. "I think you will see guys right on the edge and racing really hard. The wind is a factor, too, and if that stays up [forecast calls for 10-15 mph winds on Sunday] it will throw a little more chaos into the mix. I think you will see guys hopefully being patient with one another enough.

"I just want to get through this race and finish where I think we can."

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