3.NOV
Report from the Marlboro 500 Qualifying

Even though Alex Barron and the Arciero-Blair team concentrated their practice efforts on making their Driving 101 Ford Lola work well in race trim, they still did a very commendable job in qualifying.

Alex Barron heads out to qualify the Driving 101 Ford Lola. He qualified with a speed of 224.806 mph. Check out the weekend's Slide Show

Driving last year’s car—an admittedly slower version than the 2001 car—Barron still managed to post a qualifying time that was only .457 seconds off the time set by Alex Tagliani to win the pole for the Marlboro 500.

Barron’s lap, 32.492s for an average speed of 224.806 mph, was good enough for 19th starting spot on the grid. This meant that he out qualified notable drivers such as this year’s Indy 500 winner Helio Castroneves, series champion Gil de Ferran and Michigan 500 winner Patrick Carpentier, among others.