Richmond, Va. - In qualifications for the Crown Royal Presents the Matthew & Daniel Hansen 400 at the Richmond International Raceway, Juan Pablo Montoya went out late in the Target Chevrolet and attained the fastest speed of the day – 128.639 miles per hour for a single lap around the .75-mile oval.

The Crown Royal 400 marks the ninth NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race of the 2011 season.

For Montoya, he picked up his seventh career pole and the second of the season. Also, this marked his first pole on a track shorter than one mile in length.

“To come here and get it done is exciting,” Montoya said. “You have to drive the car very hard and I overshot the corner in turn one. I wanted to run the bottom (of the track) but I couldn’t. I did get a good exit off the corner and in turns three and four, the car was really good. My car was looser in qualifying than it had been in practice, and I was expecting the car to do one thing but it did the other.

“In practice, we had three runs. The first one was horrible, second one was pretty good and the third one was better. Our strategy was to focus on race trim during the first two hours of practice and then to go out in qualifying trim. Going out late, the track is usually faster and I thought we did a good job.”

Regan Smith came close to earning his first pole but came up 4/100ths of a second short stopping the clock with a speed of 128.382 mph in the Furniture Row Chevrolet. “I really wanted the pole,” the New York-state native said. “When you qualify well, you are happy about it. And it shows how rounded our program is, and it helps the confidence with all of us.”

Regarding his approach to the race on Saturday evening, Smith said, “Starting in the front, the air is cleaner, and it is much easier to race in the front than in the back. I don’t think anyone would understand what it is like to race in the back.”

Third and fourth fastest qualifiers were Clint Bowyer Jr. in a Chevrolet and Kasey Kahne in a Toyota.

Teammates Mark Martin and Jeff Gordon put their Chevrolets into the third row followed by Brad Kieslowski in a Dodge and Sprint Cup Series point leader Carl Edwards in a Ford.

Joey Logan in a Toyota and Kurt Busch in a Dodge rounded out the top-10 qualifiers.

Two-time race winner Denny Hamlin qualified 11th fastest followed by Kevin Harvick.

Qualifying farther down the list were Kyle Busch 20th, Dale Earnhardt Jr. 24th, Jimmie Johnson 30th, Tony Stewart 31st and Kurt Busch 32nd.

Of those required to qualify on time, David Stremme topped the group with the 16th fastest time driving for the newly formed Echo Star Chevrolet team of Timothy McSweeney. Michael McDowell, at 22nd, was the second fastest of that group.

Forty-four cars took a qualification run with Brian Keselowski the lone entry to miss out on making the starting field.

Saturday’s Crown Royal 400 will be telecast live on FOX at 7:30 p.m. ET.

(source:motorsport.com)

Juan Pablo's quali lap: