The Associated Press

ROCKINGHAM, N.C. - Dave Blaney won the first pole of his career Friday when most teams chose not to bother qualifying on a cold, wet day at North Carolina Speedway.

Practice and qualifying were delayed by rain and there was a possibility of more bad weather before the Subway 400 on Sunday, so most teams spent Friday's only practice session working on race setups.

It made for lackluster qualifying runs, with Blaney taking the top spot by turning a lap of 154.683 mph in his Ford.

"That's pretty cool," Blaney said. "But Sunday is when it really counts."

It was Blaney's first pole in 113 Winston Cup starts. His previous best starting spot was third, last year in Richmond, Va.

Johnny Benson, who scored his only Winston Cup victory here in November, qualified second in a Pontiac by turning a lap of 154.553 around Rockingham's high-banked, 1.017-mile oval. Mark Martin qualified third in the same Ford that finished second here last year. Sterling Marlin was fourth and Bill Elliott fifth in Dodges.

Bobby Labonte had the best Chevrolet at 10th, a shocking dropoff after the Monte Carlos dominated last week at Daytona.

Most crews decided to swap their setups from qualifying trim into race mode just in case today's practice session is washed out.

"I'll just say that not many people worked that hard on qualifying today," Martin said. "This is not a typical day and this is one of the greatest race tracks there is for racing and passing. So I don't think anyone was concerned about having to start in the back here."

That's where most of the top names will begin the race Sunday.

Daytona 500 winner Michael Waltrip will start 22nd, four-time Winston Cup champion Jeff Gordon 23rd and series champion Tony Stewart 33rd.

BUSCH SERIES: David Green won the pole for today's Rockingham 200 at North Carolina Speedway, knocking Winston Cup rookie Jamie McMurray from the top starting spot with a late run.

McMurray, who won the Busch race at Rockingham in November, sat on the pole for most of qualifying with a lap at 154.318 mph. But Green ran a late lap at 154.429 mph in his Pontiac to bump McMurray's Dodge into the second spot and earn the 20th Busch Series pole of his career.

CART: Rookie Sebastien Bourdais proved his early speed was no fluke, taking the provisional pole for the opening race of the season.

The Frenchman, 23, has been fast since he first drove a Champ Car in December. That continued in the early qualifying for Sunday's St. Petersburg Grand Prix.

"The first time I jumped into a Champ car, I was just getting back from Europe and driving the Formula One car," said Bourdais, a former test driver for Renault. "They're not that much different."

He sped around the 1.806-mile, 14-turn course in 1 minute, 1.676 seconds at 105.415 mph. That assured Bourdais of a front-row start no matter what he does in today's second round of time trials.

Close behind at 105.003 was Newman/Haas Racing teammate Bruno Junqueira. Oriol Servia was third at 104.760.