Hamlin rebounds from car problem to take fifth pole

After placing 14th last week, he dominated the Car of Tomorrow tests.
COMBINED DISPATCHES
MARTINSVILLE, Va. -- Virginia native Denny Hamlin found the best way to deal with disappointment.
The only driver to post a lap in excess of 95 mph, Hamlin topped Friday's qualifying session for Sunday's Goody's Cool Orange 500 NASCAR Nextel Cup race at Martinsville Speedway.
Hamlin had one of the strongest cars last week at Bristol, but a fuel pick-up problem relegated him to a 14th-place finish.
In time trials for the series' second Car of Tomorrow race, Hamlin powered his No. 11 Chevrolet around the .526-mile short track in 19.911 seconds to claim the fifth pole of his career. Jamie McMurray (94.955 mph) and points leader Jeff Gordon (94.851 mph), who will start second and third, respectively, were the only other drivers to crack the 20-second mark.
"We had a car that probably should have got the pole in Bristol last week, and we missed out on it," Hamlin said. "The race was also a tough one to swallow. To come back to my home state and win the pole definitely means a lot."
The pole is the fifth of Hamlin's career and first this year.
Strategy a big help
He said he learned last week while leading the race at Bristol that being out front in the new cars is a big help, which makes starting first especially important.
"It was a big, big deal with these cars," he said. "They punched such a big hole. Air around that track just really got disturbed and it seemed like once we got out front, we could just check out. If we were third or fourth line, we were really tight."
Ken Schrader posted his best qualifying effort since joining Wood Brothers Racing in 2006. The driver of the No. 21 Ford will start fourth after a lap at 94.623 mph. J.J. Yeley, Hamlin's teammate at Joe Gibbs Racing, claimed the fifth starting position with a lap at 94.562 mph.
Kevin Harvick, Tony Stewart, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Carl Edwards and Johnny Sauter completed the top 10. Hartford native Dave Blaney will start 22nd.
Though an early draw didn't hurt Hamlin, McMurray or Gordon, McMurray benefited from watching the 11 drivers who preceded him on the track.
"I watched all the guys before me," he said. "We went 12th, but three or four of the guys before me looked like they overdrove it, and it's pretty easy to do here. So I just tried to make a conservative first lap and then go after it on my second lap.
"Even when I felt like I really drove the car hard, I still don't feel like I drove it hard enough."
Felt day getting better
Gordon, always one of the prerace favorite at Martinsville and the other short tracks, said he felt his day getting better in the last two runs during practice.
"I felt like we really hit on some things that really changed our day," he said, allowing the team to make adjustments that made his Impala handle better. "I definitely think we're much closer to where we'd like to be here than we were at Bristol."
Five Toyota drivers, including Blaney, made the field on time for Sunday's race, but team owner Michael Waltrip was not among them. Jeremy Mayfield will start 13th, Dale Jarrett 38th, AJ Allmendinger 40th and David Reutimann 43rd.
For the second time this year, the final spot in the field came down to a contest between Waltrip and the driver of a car he owns, Reutimann.
Waltrip was the next-to-last driver to make a qualifying attempt, and by then he knew he needed to beat Reutimann's speed of 92.979 mph to race Sunday.
Waltrip fell just short, posting a lap at 92.801 mph.