 Although 52 cars were entered in the qualifier , according to NASCAR 's qualifying procedure , only 43 could race . Each driver ran two laps , with the starting order determined by the competitor 's fastest times . Riggs clinched the third pole position of his career , and his third consecutive at Lowe 's Motor Speedway , with a time of 28 @.@ 203 seconds . He was joined on the grid 's front row by Kahne , his Evernham Motorsports teammate , and held the pole position until Riggs ' lap . Kurt Busch originally qualified in third , but his car 's right @-@ rear shock absorber was found to have violated NASCAR regulations during the post @-@ qualifying inspection because it did not work as required . Busch was required to start from 42nd position after using a provisional . As a result , Casey Mears inherited third , Sadler fourth , and Harvick fifth . Burton , Martin , Clint Bowyer , Reed Sorenson and Johnson rounded out the top ten qualifiers . Kenseth , a Chase for the Nextel Cup driver , qualified eleventh , while Earnhardt took 16th and Kyle Busch 18th . The nine drivers who failed to qualify were : Elliott , Kevin Lepage , Derrike Cope , Chad Chaffin , Hermie Sadler , Kirk Shelmerdine , Kenny Wallace ( who crashed on his first timed lap ) , Morgan Shepherd ( who elected not to set a lap time ) , and Carl Long ( who crashed while attempting to record a timed lap ) . After the qualifier Riggs said that his team knew his car was good , and achieved a good draw by recording his lap time in the latter period of the session . He stated when returning to the track , his team wanted to get back into a rhythm of starting and finishing in a top position . 
