Two 120 minute practice sessions were held before the race on Friday.[10]Jeff Burton was quickest with a time of 25.702 seconds in the first session, more than two-hundredths of a second faster than Kenseth.[11]David Ragan was just off Kenseth's pace, followed by Paul Menard, Newman, and David Reutimann. A. J. Allmendinger was seventh, still within a second of Burton's time.[11] Also in the session, Kyle Busch's team changed his car's engine after engine problems.[12] In the second practice session, Menard was fastest with a time of 25.510 seconds, seven-hundredths of a second quicker than second-placed Edwards.[13]Regan Smith took third place, ahead of Brian Vickers, Kyle Busch and Jamie McMurray. Stewart could only manage 36th place.[13]
Afterward, during qualifying, forty-six cars were entered, but only forty-three were able to race because of NASCAR's qualifying procedure.[14] Kenseth clinched his third pole position during the season, with a time of 26.258 seconds.[3][15] He was joined on the front row of the grid by Allmendinger.[15]Marcos Ambrose qualified third, Mark Martin took fourth, and Martin Truex Jr. started fifth.[15] Stewart, one of the drivers in the Chase for the Sprint Cup, qualified eighth, while Edwards was scored ninth.[15] The three drivers that failed to qualify for the race were Scott Riggs, David Stremme, and Andy Lally.[15] Once the qualifying session completed, Kenseth commented, "Jimmy Fennig, had a strategy to go fast in the first practice to go out late. Even though we knew the temperature would be hotter he thought the track could be faster with more cars having run on it. A lot of people chose the opposite strategy and worked on race set-up in the first practice and did their qualifying stuff in the second practice to go out early."[3]
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