Martin On The Sharpie 500 Pole; Ragan Wins Food City 250

Mark Martin has won the pole at Bristol
Motor Speedway for a race that will be critical to his Chase for
the championship chances.
    Martin turned a lap at 124.484 mph to win his fifth pole of the
season and sweep the top starting spot at Bristol this season. He
beat Greg Biffle, who ran a lap at 124.307, and rookie Scott Speed,
who qualified third at 124.146.
    Martin’s effort is a huge boost for the No. 5 team, which was
reeling after running out of gas last week at Michigan. It cost
Martin a top-10 finish and he’s now clinging to the 12th and final
Chase berth with three races to go.
    Meanwhile, feuding drivers Brian Vickers and Kyle Busch
qualified 14th and 15th - meaning they’ll start close to each other
in Saturday night’s race.
  And on the Nationwide series David Ragan has held off Carl Edwards on a
two-lap sprint to the finish to win the Nationwide Series race at
Bristol Motor Speedway.
    Edwards was second Friday night and shaved nearly 100 points off
of Kyle Busch’s daunting lead in the series standings.
    Busch was wrecked by 19-year-old Chase Austin minutes after
taking the lead early in the race. He repaired his car to get back
on the track, but finished a distant 28th.
    Brad Keselowski finished third by overcoming his own early
accident. Kevin Harvick and Matt Kenseth rounded out the top five.
    It was only the second NASCAR victory for Ragan, who also won
the Nationwide race at Talladega in April.