Jeremy Mayfield and Kasey Kahne need a good race weekend at California Speedway.
The Evernham Motorsports teammates, who are just outside the top 10 in the NASCAR Nextel Cup season points, got off to a good start Friday, qualifying second and fifth in the 43-car field for the Pop Secret 500.
PHOTO: AFP
Both are battling for spots in NASCAR's new Chase for the Nextel Cup with only two races remaining until the championship contenders are pared to the top 10 for the 10-race run to the finish.
The qualifying effort by Mayfield, tied for 12th in the standings, and Kahne, tied for 11th in the points, overshadowed the second career pole by 20-year-old Brian Vickers, who turned a lap of 187.417 mph. Also overshadowed was the strong showing by 48-year-old Bill Elliott, the semiretired former series champion who qualified at 186.364 despite running in only his fifth race of the season and first since early last month at Indianapolis.
"The car was awesome," Vickers said. "The guys did a good job. It stuck. What else can I say?"
Elliott said he was surprised by his run.
"We changed everything but the driver after practice," he said. "I asked what we ran and, when they told me, I thought they were kidding."
Mayfield slipped in between the youngest and oldest drivers in the race with a lap of 186.364, with Kurt Busch right behind Elliott at 185.955 and Kahne next at 185.816.
"This is such a hard sport for everything to go right," said Mayfield, who will go into Sunday's race trailing 10th-place Ryan Newman by just 35 points.
Mayfield is excited about the battle for the top 10.
"It's pretty cool that it's coming down this close just for 10th," he said. "We could come down eighth or ninth this weekend. You never know any more what's going to happen and how the race is going to end up."
Kahne was happy with his qualifying effort, but said the whole Evernham team, from owner Ray Evernham to the workers who stay in the shop in Statesville, North Carolina, are focused right now on getting into the top 10.
"We have to run good this weekend or we're going to be battling for 11th the rest of the year, and that wouldn't be as much fun," Kahne said.
While series leader Jeff Gordon, runner-up Jimmie Johnson and third-place Dale Earnhardt Jr. have already clinched spots in the top 10, there are plenty of other drivers who will go into Sunday's race with a more uncertain future.
The gap between eighth-place Kevin Harvick and Dale Jarrett and Jamie McMurray, tied for 14th place, is just 50 points.
Casey Mears was sixth in Cup qualifying at 185.802, followed by Greg Biffle at 185.773.
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