The oldest and youngest drivers, respectively, will share the front row for Saturday's Coke Zero 400 at the Daytona International Speedway.
Mark Martin, 52, nipped 20-year-old Daytona 500 champion Trevor Bayne for the top spot. It is Martin's third Daytona pole; he also sat on the pole for this race in 1989 and took the top spot for the 2010 Daytona 500. Martin has never recorded a points-paying victory at Daytona, coming heartbreakingly close many times before, though he did win the 1999 Bud Shootout.
Bayne, meanwhile, has quite the box score at the World Center of Speed: one start, one win. He shocked the racing world by pulling off one of the all-time upsets in American sports this February, giving the Wood Brothers their first win in nearly a decade and only their fourth win in the last twenty years.
Richard Childress Racing's Clint Bowyer will start third. Jeff Gordon, who leads all active drivers with six Daytona victories - including Coke Zero 400 triumphs in 1995, 1998, and 2004 - will roll off from the fourth spot, while Georgia's own David Ragan starts fifth.
The rest of the top-10 drivers are Dale Earnhardt Jr., a two-time Daytona winner, rookie Andy Lally, 2006 Daytona 500 champion Jimmie Johnson, A.J. Allmendinger, and Paul Menard. Defending Coke Zero 400 winner Kevin Harvick starts 31st
Bayne and Lally, who each recorded career-best qualifying efforts, led the go-or-go-home contingent. Other drivers who made the field on speed were Kevin Conway (22nd), Travis Kvapil (27th), Mike Skinner (29th), 1986 Daytona 500 winner Geoff Bodine (35th), and Joe Nemechek (37th). Missing the show were Tony Raines and J.J. Yeley.