Update

**gomick** · 25 Feb 2005, 22:30

did dale jarrett set a lap time (if so, what time was it) or did he get the daytona pole from winning one of those 150 races

marcus · 26 Feb 2005, 01:10

no the gatorade duels were won by Tony Stewart and michael Waltrip I believe so I'd say it was a qualifying run that got jarrett the pole , not that it did him any good in the race

William Dale Jr · 26 Feb 2005, 02:04

Yeah, spot on Marcus.

The way qualifying for the 500 works (or at least 'worked', I'm not sure how the new top-35 ruling effected this) is they firstly run the usual one-run, two-lap qualifying session and this sets the front row of the grid (fastest and second fastest qualifier) and the starting order for the Gatorade races (odd-numbered qualifiers in one race, evens in the other, starting in the order they finished qualifying). The finishing order of the two races sets the next 9 or 10 rows of the grid, and the rest of the field is made up out of the remaining cars based on the qualifying speeds and provisionals. There's probably a better explanation at somewhere like nascar.com or jayski.com, but that's basically how it works.

The one thing I've always found interesting is that the front-row qualifiers have to do the qualifying races. They have to race the car they qualify and if they destroy it and have to switch to the backup for the 500, they still have to move to the back of the grid. I think this happened to Ken Schrader in 1990.

Snips1 · 26 Feb 2005, 12:15

I just don't get this kind of qualifying system, why can't they just wualify like everybody else???

**gomick** · 28 Feb 2005, 06:38

i think it was run differently this year because i havent seen anywhere that dale jarrett did a 48.000 or whatever lap time

Joe Fan · 1 Mar 2005, 20:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by gomick

i think it was run differently this year because i havent seen anywhere that dale jarrett did a 48.000 or whatever lap time

William Dale Jr's comment is correct. Jarrett won the pole in a traditional qualifying session. The top two qualifiers are locked on the starting grid but the rest of the field is determined in the two 150 mile races (which used be 125 mile races and called the Twin 125s). This is the only Nextel Cup race that is done like this.