 Although forty-five cars were entered in the qualifier, according to NASCAR's qualifying procedure, only forty-three could race. Each driver ran two laps, with the starting order determined by the competitor's fastest times. Travis Kvapil clinched the first pole position of his career with a time of 51.109 seconds. He was joined on the grid's front row by Mears in his best qualifying performance of the season. Aric Almirola qualified third, his Dale Earnhardt, Inc. teammate Regan Smith was fourth, and Paul Menard started fifth. Mike Wallace, Joe Nemechek, Tony Raines, Vickers and Martin Truex, Jr. rounded out the top ten qualifiers. Of the other drivers in the Chase, Edwards was twelfth, Burton 17th and Johnson 20th. The two drivers that failed to qualify were Sam Hornish, Jr. and Patrick Carpentier. After the qualifier Kvapil said, "Definitely qualifying doesn't really mean much as far as your chances to win the race after 500 miles, but we got a good pit selection and we 'll have less chance to get caught up in a wreck early on in the race. It doesn't take long to get shuffled to the back and I 'm sure I'll be shuffled in and out throughout the field. But the first few laps we 'll be up front and hopefully keeping it clean." He also stated the pole was "special", and this was the first time Ford had occupied that position at Talladega Superspeedway since 1997.
