Mayfield sweeps to Darlington Bud Pole.

Almost all season, Rusty Wallace has been the centre of attention at each Bud Pole qualifying contest with the Penske-South driver recording an astonishing eight pole positions so far in 2000. On Friday at the car breaking Darlington Raceway, Penske teammate Jeremy Mayfield took some of the heat off his buddy to score his first career Pole at Darlington and the third of the 2000 season.

Mayfield went to the top of the time sheets mid-way through the session with a time of 29.022 seconds in his Ford Taurus and although Pontiac's Johnny Benson got to within six thousandths of a second, the Penske-Kranefuss driver's time stood firm.

The pole is a great boost to Mayfield who has dropped to a non-reflective 22nd in the points standings after missing two races due to a concussion. Mayfield has won twice this year and has been one of the fastest drivers on many occasions only to suffer a number of crippling problems. Despite Darlington's reputation as being the toughest on the Winston Cup circuit, Mayfield will be looking o move up the championship table with a strong result.

Joining him on the front row is the outstanding Johnny Benson who is having his best Winston Cup year to date by a great deal. The under funded Pontiac driver has shone throughout the year and is on course for one of his best Winston Cup points finishes ever in the Aaron's Rent's MBV Motorsport entry.

Ward Burton, winner of the shortened Mall.com 400 back in March survived a brush with the wall in qualifying to record third best time with an impressive 29.052-second effort. Joining him on the second row is the RCR Lowe's Chevrolet of Mike Skinner who lapped just four hundredths of a second slower than Mayfield.

Mark Martin rounded out the top five ahead of Dale Earnhardt on a day where Darlington claimed its first victims of the weekend.

Points leader Bobby Labonte was the first man to be caught out when he backed his Interstate Batteries Pontiac into the wall in what turned out to be a very costly incident. The Joe Gibbs driver was forced into the unsorted back-up car for qualifying and he could only manage 38th fastest time, almost 30 places behind his nearest title rival Dale Jarrett.

Three drivers failed to register a Bud Pole time and will have to settle for a provisional starting slot; Terry Labonte and Steve Park both lost engines while the returning Stacy Compton did his injury problems no favours when he hit the wall in his Melling Racing Ford.

Of those to survive their qualifying laps, Scott Pruett was very pleased with his seventh placed effort while Ken Schrader, Jarrett and Jeff Gordon rounded out the top ten in what should be a real test of endurance for any driver not at the absolute peak of his fitness.

Of the 'Bud Pole King,' Wallace had a quiet run to 16th place, one ahead of Ricky Rudd in the second Robert Yates entry. Both were comfortably inside the top 25 and do not have to worry about the pressures of second round qualifying whereas those who do include Tony Stewart, (39th) Jeff Burton, (35th) and Darrell Waltrip who was mired back in 40th place for his last ever race at Darlington.