Carl Edwards started 2012 in front by winning the pole for the season's opening Daytona 500. Last season, he opened by finishing second and fell short in winning the NASCAR championship on a tie-breaker to Tony Stewart.
This week, Edwards turned a lap at 194.738 mph in his No. 99 Roush Fenway Racing Ford Fusion. It is the fastest pole-winning speed since Jeff Gordon's lap of 195.067 mph in 1999.
"It's so neat to come down here and to be so fast and to really have fun qualifying here," Edwards said. "These are the best race cars we've ever had at Daytona. Coming down here I didn't even consider the pole, so this is huge."
For the Budweiser Shootout on Saturday at the Daytona International Speedway, only 13 of the original 25 cars in the field were running at the end of the race after several episodes of spinouts and multiple car wreckage.
During Sunday's session, six of the nine fastest times were set by Fords.
"After seeing how hard everybody works all winter and how much pride the guys take in how these cars qualify, it does mean something to me," Edwards said of his pole-winning run. "It's a sign of the strength of your team and it's not that we just have one car up there. To have that whole front row says a lot about Roush Fenway Racing, about Ford. It's huge for our sponsors."
Roush Fenway Racing was founded and co-owned by Jack Roush and won the July Daytona race four times with one victory in Daytona 500 in 2009.
"Doug Yates and the guys in the engine shop did a nice job," Roush said. "Robbie Reiser and the folks in the chassis and body shop built nice cars and the teams prepared them well. We worked all winter getting ready for this. It's just the beginning. We hope we can put it together for the Twin 150s and for the 500 next Sunday."
