Carlsbad's Said makes the cut for Daytona

By: Staff and Wire Reports - | Sunday, February 11, 2007 8:00 PM PST ∞

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. ---- The television broadcast of crew chief Frank Stoddard's radio transmission said everything about Boris Said's Daytona 500 qualifying run Sunday.

Seconds after Carlsbad's Said crossed the finish line at Daytona International Speedway, the Fox telecast cued a tape of the exasperated Stoddard. His message: "We are, uh, fifth, OK?" Stoddard said. "Fifth. I don't know how we've done it, but we're fifth.

"I can finally eat."

And breathe.

Said, Stoddard and the No Fear Racing team will be driving in the 49th annual Daytona 500 in six days. Said posted the sixth fastest qualifying time of the 61 drivers attempting to drive in next week's race. Robert Yates Racing drivers David Gilliland and Ricky Rudd finished 1-2 in qualifying with NASCAR Nextel Cup rookie Juan Pablo Montoya fourth overall.

Gilliland turned a lap of 186.320 mph to win the pole, and Rudd was right behind at 185.609 to put themselves on the front row for the season-opening race.

"It's like a dream that I'm afraid to wake up from," said Gilliland, coming off Saturday night's second-place finish in the exhibition Budweiser Shootout.

Gilliland and Rudd were the only two drivers to lock down their starting spots under a complicated qualifying procedure for NASCAR's biggest event of the year that was marred when Matt Kenseth and Kasey Kahne's cars failed inspection and Michael Waltrip's was impounded because of a suspicious part.

The top 35 drivers from 2006 are assured a spot in the 500, but their starting position will be determined by a pair of qualifying races Thursday. It leaves eight other spots to fill, and 26 drivers are vying for them. Dale Jarrett is guaranteed one of them by virtue of the past champions provisional, as are the three fastest drivers in qualifying from that group. That caveat promised Said, Sterling Marlin and Johnny Sauter spots in the race.

Said turned a 185.212-mph lap, fastest of the 26 drivers who weren't automatically qualified for the race.

So for the time being, Said can rest easy knowing he'll be driving in NASCAR's Super Bowl.

"It's like two cinder blocks falling off your shoulders," Said noted in a phone interview. "You feel like a failure if you let the (sponsors) down. Now you can think about the race."

That wasn't quite Said's train of thought when he woke up Sunday. He was only hoping he wouldn't have to go into his Gatorade 150 dual race on Thursday needing a top-two finish among the nonqualifiers.

Now, he and Stoddard can spend the rest of the week prepping for Sunday.

"I had a big knot in my stomach when I woke up," Said noted. "It's like having a book report due and you didn't start on it. There are a lot of good cars here. I'm elated."

Said was the 47th driver to make his qualifying run. But it didn't appear that a later start hurt or helped him during the three-hour-plus qualifying affair as the wind stayed persistent the entire day.

"It's a long day," Said explained. "This is the most nerve-racking thing a person can go through. To be in the show in Daytona is just great. I can't believe the day is over."

Staff writer Dan Hayes and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Toyota, which is making its Nextel Cup debut this season, had a horrendous qualifying effort and will need brilliant qualifying races to get the bulk of its Camrys into the field.

Jarrett is in, along with Dave Blaney, who earned a berth because of his 2006 standings. But the rest of the bunch struggled, including Waltrip, whose intake manifold was confiscated at the start of the day because inspectors found a questionable substance inside the part.

Waltrip, a two-time Daytona 500 winner, was 25th in qualifying and his Camry was later impounded.

"There's nothing wrong with it," Waltrip insisted. "We just had an oil problem of some sort."

David Reutimann was the best of the Toyota bunch at 15th, and was followed by Mike Skinner (18th), Waltrip, Blaney (39th), A.J. Allmendinger (40th), Brian Vickers (45th) and Jarrett (50th).

Juan Pablo Montoya flirted with the front row, putting his new No. 42 Dodge in the second spot only to be bumped from it moments later by teammate David Stremme.

Stremme ended up third and Montoya was fourth, but teammate Reed Sorenson was a disappointing 44th after blowing a battery in his car on his second qualifying lap. Still, it was a radical improvement for the Chip Ganassi Racing team, which is looking to Montoya to help jump-start a program that hasn't won a Cup race since 2002.

"I think it really shows how far Chip Ganassi Racing has come," Montoya said. "I think the engine program has come a long way. It's just nice to see that we've got a lot of potential."

But the day belonged to Yates, who won the Daytona 500 pole for the fifth time in his career. Davey Allison won the first in 1992, then Jarrett grabbed it in 1995, 2000 and 2005.

Although the pole means very little in terms of the actual race, it puts Yates' team in the spotlight for the entire week leading up to the event -- sweet redemption considering many wondered if it would even survive a disastrous 2006.

First Jarrett bolted for Waltrip's new Toyota team, and sponsor UPS followed. Then Elliott Sadler asked out of his contract forcing Yates to essentially start from scratch in his 40th year of racing.

It had Yates so stressed out, the owner was convinced he was dying and turned to prescription medication to alleviate the stress.

"Robert, sitting there watching him ... it was pretty sad to see how low the team had gotten," Rudd said.

And now?

"Robert has got a little bit of a bounce in his step again because he has a program that is working, it is clicking," Rudd said.

Indeed it is, and it all began when Yates gambled on signing Gilliland, a West Coast racer who rocketed onto the NASCAR radar by winning a Busch race last June in an underfunded, part-time team.

It had car owners clamoring to sign the 30-year-old unknown, and Gilliland chose the struggling Yates team and couldn't have been more sure of his decision after Sunday.

"After some of the stuff that was said about the Yates organization last year, I'm real proud to come out real strong," Gilliland said. "Hopefully this is a sign of things to come."

Yates still needed a sponsor to keep his flagship No. 88 afloat, and he got it in December when Snickers signed onto the car. Then he coaxed Rudd to end his one-year sabbatical from racing.

"I would not have come back to work if I did not think this team was solid enough to win some races," Rudd said.