Kahne edges Montoya for Bristol pole

Bristol, TN (Sports Network) - In one of the closest qualifying sessions of the season, Kasey Kahne captured the pole for Saturday night's Sharpie 500 Nextel Cup race at the Bristol Motor Speedway short track. The No.9 Gillett Evernham Motorsports Dodge circled the 0.533-mile high-banked half mile in 16.016 seconds (119.805 m.p.h.).
The pole victory was Kahne's second of the season and 14th of his "Cup" career.
"It felt good to get a couple of Dodges on the front row," said Kahne, who has yet to win in 2007 after winning six times the previous year. "A great start to the weekend, we need stuff like this to go on, it's been kind of a rough season."
Starting alongside Kahne, in just his second start at Bristol, will be Juan Pablo Montoya who posted a time of 16.064 seconds.
Jamie McMurray (16.103) and David Ragan (16.105) will make up row two. A total of 13 drivers were within 0.020 seconds of the pole winner.
Other drivers of note at their starting positions: Carl Edwards (sixth), Ryan Newman (seventh), Jimmie Johnson (ninth), Dale Earnhardt Jr. (17th) and points leader Jeff Gordon (18th).
Kurt Busch, who owns the 12th and final position in the "Chase for the Nextel Cup," has built his lead to 163 points over 13th-place Earnhardt Jr. and 171 over his Penske Racing teammate Newman. His second win in the last three races also means that should he make the "Chase" he would start with the fourth- highest total. Only Gordon (four wins), Johnson (four) and Tony Stewart (three) would begin the 10-race "playoffs" with more points.
In 13 career starts at BMS, Busch has one pole, five wins and eight top-10s. Between the spring of 2002 and the spring of 2004 he won four of five races and has led a total of 560 laps.
As always when you try and shoehorn 43 cars onto the high-banked, Bristol Motor Speedway track, expect to see plenty of bent sheetmetal and frustrated drivers. It makes for great racing.
The race is scheduled to drop the green flag on Saturday at 8 p.m. (et).