Benson had the second-fastest time
with a qualifying lap of 29.031 seconds at 131.198 mph and
will join Newman on the front row. It is his ninth top-10
start in 2002 and his best start since he started second at
Las Vegas in 2001.
Benson Quotes:
"I'm not going to complain. Actually, our first run in
practice wasn't that good and we did a lot of work to this
Valvoline Pontiac and just got it better and better. I'm
real happy with it. No matter where we end up, we're going
to be okay for the race. I believe this car is going to race
pretty good. I would've sure loved to have had a pole, but
we had a couple of guys behind us that were pretty good too,
so we'll end up where we end up."
"We were pretty happy with practice.
When we unloaded the car we were only about 25th quick, but
we made a couple of changes. (Crew chief) James Ince and the
guys are just doing a tremendous job. They got the car a
little bit more comfortable for me, and by the end of
practice we were second on the sheet and that's where we
ended up in qualifying.
YOUR COMMENTS ON THE TRACK
"It's great, I don't know what they were complaining about last time, but
then I wasn't here. So it's been great - I'm not going to
complain at all. It seems to have a lot of grip in it, but I
haven't got out past the outside groove either. I think it
will be fine and we'll just have to deal with it if things
start to happen.
PHYSICALLY HOW DO YOU FEEL?
"I'm in good shape. When I wrecked at Daytona I broke
totally different ribs than I did in Richmond. I think I'm
in okay shape now. Obviously I don't want to hit anything,
but by the same token I think we're fine."
