Brian Vickers thought he finally had some good news to override the controversy of the past week.
The 25-year-old Red Bull Racing driver won the pole for Sunday's Auto Club 500, barely beating heavily favored Jimmie Johnson. But, about an hour after taking the sixth pole of his NASCAR Sprint Cup career with a lap of 183.429 mph, Vickers found out his team would have to change the engine in his No. 83 Toyota, sending him to the back of the 43-car field.
He will still be listed as the pole winner, but the youngster will drop out of line when the cars start moving Sunday and fall to the back, while Johnson, whose fast lap was 183.164, gets to lead the field to the green flag.
Jamie McMurray was third at 182.653, followed by Kurt Busch at 182.556, Greg Biffle at 182.302, Jeff Gordon at 182.209, Zephyrhills' David Reutimann at 182.089 and A.J. Allmendinger, the fastest of the drivers who had to qualifying on speed, at 182.048.
Rookie Scott Speed, Vickers' teammate, was ninth at 181.965 and Kyle Busch, who won the pole for today's Camping World Truck Series race earlier in the day, rounded out at the top 10 at 181.919.
Tony Stewart, racing for his own Stewart-Haas Racing team for only the second time in a Cup event, was 11th at 181.901.
NHRA: Larry Dixon led Top Fuel qualifying in the Lucas Oil Slick Mist NHRA Nationals in Chandler, Ariz., with a 3.807-second run at 313.95 mph.
Ron Capps and Mike Edwards also topped their divisions. Capps raced to the Funny Car lead with a 4.023 at 305.63 in a Dodge Charger, and Edwards had a track-record time of 6.605 at 208.71 in a Pontiac GXP to lead the 16-car Pro Stock order.
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