NASCAR: Gordon wins pole

Deseret News (Salt Lake City), Mar 8, 2008

At Hampton, Ga., Jeff Gordon, bouncing back from a hard crash in Las Vegas, felt a whole lot better Friday night after winning the pole for the NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Atlanta Motor Speedway. On Sunday, Gordon walked away without injury after bouncing off the car driven by Matt Kenseth and slamming into the wall in a hit that tore apart the front of his car, leaving his radiator sitting steaming on the track.

"I was sore, but none of the soreness affected me in the race car," Gordon said after posting a fast lap of 185.251 mph on the 1.5-mile Atlanta oval, easily faster than the 184.852 of Dale Earnhardt Jr. Martin Truex Jr. made it a sweep of the top three places for Chevrolet with a lap of 183.807. Carl Edwards, coming off two wins in a row, but under the shadow this week of a NASCAR penalty that knocked him out of the points lead, didn't let it bother him as his Ford qualified fourth at 183.287, just ahead of the 183.248 by six-time Atlanta winner Bobby Labonte in a Dodge and the 182.910 of Kyle Busch in a Toyota.