Newman rockets past Gordon for Martinsville pole

Ryan Newman edged Jeff Gordon in Friday's qualifying at Martinsville Speedway to claim the pole for the Tums Fast Relief 500 -- the sixth race in the "Chase for the Sprint Cup" championship.

Newman lapped the flat 0.526-mile track at 96.795 m.p.h. (19.563 seconds) for his second pole of the season and the 45th of his Sprint Cup Series career.

"It was a really good lap," Newman said. "It kind of helped to go out a little bit later to see Mark [Martin] and Jeff and see where there might have some gains to be made."

Newman also grabbed his third pole at Martinsville. His best finish here is second, which came in the 2007 fall race.

Gordon, who leads all active drivers with seven poles at Martinsville, turned a lap at 96.519 m.p.h. for the outside pole.

"This is the kind of qualifying session that we were certainly hoping for, so nice to see things going our way so far this weekend," Gordon said.

Martin Truex Jr. qualified third, while Mark Martin and David Reutimann rounded out the top-five.

Casey Mears, rookie Joey Logano, Bobby Labonte, Reed Sorenson and Kevin Harvick qualified sixth through 10th, respectively.

Newman, Gordon and Martin were the only Chase contenders to qualify in the top-10.

Jimmie Johnson, the current points leader, starts 15th. Johnson has won five of the last six races at Martinsville. His lead is now 90 points over Martin and 135 ahead of Gordon.

Other Chase drivers and their starting positions include: Tony Stewart (13th), Denny Hamlin (17th), Greg Biffle (20th), Juan Pablo Montoya (21st), Brian Vickers (24th), Kasey Kahne (26th), Carl Edwards (29th) and Kurt Busch (37th).

Josh Wise was the only driver who failed to qualify.

Sunday's 500-lap race is scheduled to start just after 1:30 p.m. (et).

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