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| | Friday, November 3 Wallace is seventh in point standings | |||||
| Associated Press AVONDALE, Ariz. -- If NASCAR awarded points for winning poles, Rusty Wallace might well be contending for his second championship. The Winston Cup star turned on the jets again Friday, taking his series-leading ninth pole of the season in the opening round of qualifying for the Checker Auto Parts/Dura Lube 500. Wallace, driving a Penske Racing South Ford Taurus, streaked around the mile Phoenix International Raceway oval at 134.178 mph, burying the previous record of 132.714 set last November by John Andretti. In fact, the top 14 drivers surpassed Andretti's record at the desert track on an unseasonably cool, overcast afternoon. Wallace, who also has four victories this season, heads into Sunday's 500-mile race a disappointing seventh in the season standings, trailing leader Bobby Labonte by 530 points and 95 behind sixth-place Tony Stewart, the defending Phoenix race winner. "It really is disappointing to have those kind of numbers and still be so far back in the points," said Wallace, the 1989 champion. "But it's just consistency. I've missed in the (chassis) set-up a couple of times and we've had two blown engines. "Really, with the stress we put on these engines nowadays, two blown engines isn't all that bad, and we were leading both of those races when the engines blew. But, still, if you can't win the championship, you just want to be in the top 10 and get to the stage at the banquet in New York. So I'm pretty happy with this team and we've they've done this year." Wallace, who has 20 top-10 starts in 32 races this season, said he was surprised to win this pole, the 35th of his career - particularly after being "really off" in the first practice Friday morning. "We came off the truck really bad," Wallace said. "We've changed just about everything on the car since then. All day long, we were taking three steps forward and two back. In qualifying, we took three steps forward and none back." Jeff Burton, who is third in the points and still has at least a long shot chance at the championship, wound up second in qualifying at 134.103, followed by Robert Pressley at 133.279, Johnny Benson at 133.175 and Steve Park at 133.161. Labonte, who leads runner-up Dale Earnhardt by a daunting 201 points with three races remaining, qualified ninth, just ahead of rookie Ryan Newman, Wallace's new Penske teammate who will race in Winston Cup for the first time on Sunday. "I was nervous for Ryan," Wallace said. "It's the first time for him and we just didn't know what was going to happen. I'm happier for him than I am for me." The third Penske entry, Jeremy Mayfield, was last among the 25 qualifiers who locked up starting positions in the 43-car field. Labonte, who only needs to finish 14th or better in each of the last three races to assure his first title, said, "We definitely hadn't practice that good. I better remember what I did just then because we did something right and I haven't been able to do it all day. And I've been trying real hard." Earnhardt was 31st and, like the rest of the drivers who were not in the top 25, will have the opportunity to requalify or stand on their first-round speed on Saturday. "We're OK," Earnhardt said. "I guess I was going after it too hard, but I feel good about." | ALSO SEE Checker Auto Parts/DuraLube 500 qualifying Checker Auto Parts/Dura Lube 500 Breakdown Labonte avoids disaster, rolls toward title Stewart close to another record AUDIO/VIDEO   Rusty Wallace talks with ESPN's Matt Yocum after winning the pole in Phoenix.RealVideo: 28.8   Jeff Burton doesn't mind qualifying second on a track like Phoenix.wav: 170 k RealAudio: 14.4 | 28.8 | 56.6 For qualifying, Robert Pressley was trying to equal his near-perfect run in practice.wav: 143 k RealAudio: 14.4 | 28.8 | 56.6 Steve Park and his crew really had to put their heads together to end up with a fifth place finish.wav: 179 k RealAudio: 14.4 | 28.8 | 56.6 | |||||
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