Bobby Labonte qualified fifth for the UAW-GM Quality 500 during Bud Pole Qualifying Oct. 13 at Charlotte Motor Speedway Concord, N.C. Labonte turned a lap of 28.027 seconds, 192.671 mph in the No. 18 Interstate Batteries Chevrolet. It was Labonte’s best qualifying effort since April when he qualified fourth at Phoenix. It’s the second time in three weeks that Labonte has qualified in the top 10. He qualified seventh two weeks ago at Talladega.

“It was a good lap,” Labonte said. “We ran a lap in practice that I screwed up on, but we still ran a decent lap, so I thought, man, we should have done better. We just worked on the car a little bit to make the adjustments for night time. You know, we just tweaked it a little bit here and there and got us a really good lap in. The guys on the Interstate Batteries Chevrolet did a good job today. We just worked on a race setup the first practice, then we worked on qualifying setup the second practice, so I’m happy about our efforts. ”

Elliott Sadler won the Bud Pole, while Ryan Newman qualified second. Labonte’s teammates, Tony Stewart and Denny Hamlin, qualified fourth and 41st, respectively. Stewart turned a lap of 28.022, 192.706, while Hamlin turned a lap of 28.723, 188.003.

The UAW-GM Quality 500 begins at 7 p.m. (EDT) and will be broadcast live on NBC and PRN

Source: http://http://www.joegibbsracing.com

Date: 10/18/2005 11:49:06 AM