Jeb Burton became the eighth different pole sitter for tomorrow’s eighth-annual fred’s 250 powered by Coca-Cola at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway and more impressively grabbed his sixth Keystone pole of the season driving the No. 4 Arrowhead / Kangaroo Express Chevrolet Silverado for Turner Scott Motorsports (TSM).
Burton edged fellow Chevrolet racer Max Gresham in his Talladega debut to make up the front row for the 18th race of the 2013 season.
“From practice to qualifying our team has the speed, we just haven’t been able to finish it in the race,” said Burton, who currently is fourth in the title chase. “Here at Talladega we’re going to race smart, so if things go our way we could win the championship.”
NASCAR Sprint Cup Series ace and Chase contender Kyle Busch was third in his No. 51 ToyotaCare Toyota Tundra, while TSM teammate James Buescher was fourth with Richard Childress Racing’s Ty Dillon rounding out the top-five.
Ron Hornaday Jr. was sixth for NTS Motorsports, while practice winner Ross Chastain grabbed seventh. Brendan Gaughan, who announced Friday morning he will return to the NASCAR Nationwide Series full-time in 2014 claimed eighth ahead of Kyle Busch Motorsports teammates Joey Coulter and Darrell Wallace Jr. to comprise the remainder of the top-10.
Mason Mingus will make his NASCAR Camping World Truck Series debut on Saturday afternoon after qualifying 12th in the No. 35 Call 811 Before You Dig / MarkIt Madness! Chevrolet Silverado for Win-Tron Racing. He was flanked by Ryan Blaney, Dakoda Armstrong and Brennan Newberry to close out the top-15.
Chris Fontaine returns to the trucks series and will start 17th in his final race of the year, while defending race winner Parker Kligerman carrying the BRG Motorsports banner followed behind in 18th.
Clay Greenfield and Sean Corr, both making infrequent starts on the tour put their machines 21st and 22nd on the grid respectively, while series points leader Matt Crafton and Johnny Sauter will start deep in the field, 25th and 26th to be exact.
Caleb Holman will make his Talladega NCWTS debut starting 28th for Henderson Motorsports.
Timothy Peters, the most recent winner in competition at Las Vegas (Nev.) Motor Speedway last month had a poor qualifying run Friday afternoon in his No. 17 Parts Plus Toyota Tundra and will lineup 31st Saturday.
Behind Peters, Jeff Agnew, Norm Benning, Scott Stenzel, Chris Cockrum and Mike Harmon will make up the remaining 36 trucks for the highly anticipated thriller.
38 trucks were vying for 36 spots putting Danny Efland and Jennifer Jo Cobb on the sidelines.
The fred’s 250 powered by Coca-Cola (94 laps / 250.04 miles) is the 18th of 23 races on the 2013 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series tour. The field will take the green flag on Saturday, October 19th shortly after 3:00 p.m. with live coverage on Fox Sports 1, the Motor Racing Network (Radio) and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio (Satellite, Channel 90). Pre-race coverage of the contest lifts off at 2:30 p.m. also on SPEED. All times are local (Central).
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
