NASCAR Cup Series

MARK MARTIN, No. 55 Aaron's Dream Machine Toyota Camry, Michael Waltrip Racing - Starting Position: 1st, How strong was your car in qualifying? "Rodney Childers (crew chief) and all the guys on this Aaron's Dream Machine do such an incredible job. The car was right on the money. They started talking about what they were going to do to it for qualifying and I just covered my ears up and left. They came to me later and said, 'We weren't trying to scare you.' I told them, 'You just do what you do and I'll drive it.' These guys always do such a great job. This 2013 Camry is just rolling."

Kasey Kahne led the way for Team Chevy in qualifying by piloting his No. 5 Quaker State Chevrolet SS to a second-place effort for Sunday’s Subway Fresh Fit 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Phoenix International Raceway (PIR), Round 2 of 36 on the 2013 tour. Kahne missed collecting the pole by four hundredths of a second. This will be the highest Kahne has ever started at the 1.0-mile track.

After a solid first qualifying lap at the Phoenix International Raceway 1-mile oval Friday, Busch's No. 78 Furniture Row/Beautyrest Chevrolet SS scraped the wall during the second lap due to a malfunction in the coolant system.

Mark Martin captured his third career pole at the Phoenix International Raceway and this is his 20th career top-10 start dating back to his debut here in 1988. At 54 years old, Martin still shocks guys like the young Kasey Kahne, who will start on the front row for the first time at Phoenix.

KASEY KAHNE, NO. 5 QUAKER STATE CHEVROLET SS – QUALIFIED SECOND - TAKE US THROUGH YOUR LAP "I thought on the first lap I just slid, probably the front tires more than anything; the second lap I had more grip and was able to push a little bit harder. It felt pretty good from where we came from in practice. We made some good adjustments there. They've done a nice job with our Quaker State Chevrolet. I think that's a pretty good lap for right now and hopefully it will stay somewhere in the top 10. I would imagine we'll get quicker as we go, but you never know."

BRAD KESELOWSKI – No. 2 Miller Lite Ford Fusion – “It was OK. I wanted to obviously be on the pole if I could, but we just didn’t quite have enough speed to do that. It’s kind of disappointing because I know my car is so fast in race trim and I was hoping that would carry over to qualifying, but we haven’t been able to hit that for whatever reason. We’ll just go back to the drawing board.”

Matt Kenseth showed off some speed this Friday morning as his No.20 Dollar General Toyota was the fastest in the first session of practice. Kenseth's lap was at over 137.023 mph. Joe Gibbs Racing took three of the top five positions.

JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 PEPSI MAX CHEVROLET SS met with media and discussed learning the new race car, the softer Goodyear tire, Danica Patrick’s performance at Daytona, an extra day of testing in Las Veqas, and more.

“We want to win championships – that what we’re here for. To do that, you first need to be consistent each and every week." - Kyle Busch, February 2013

JEFF BURTON, NO. 31 CHEERIOS CHEVROLET SS, met with members of the media at Phoenix International Raceway and discussed the performance of the new car on track at Phoenix, what he is looking forward to next week at Las Vegas and other topics.