Green brushes wall, looks to 2005

Homestead, Fl. – A brush with the wall on the second lap of practice cost Mark Green valuable practice time and he was unable to qualify the LoveFiFi.com Chevrolet for the Ford 300 on Thursday.

“ The car was great,” said Green. “I just got a little too fast before the tires had a chance to heat up and I slid up into the wall. The crew did a great job on it but we just couldn’t make up for the lost track time.”

The unsuccessful attempt ends an impressive string of qualifications efforts for the team. Green had qualified in five straight races before today. His time of 31.766 seconds was just one and one-half tenths of a second out of the field.

“ We don’t have anything to hang our heads over,” said Green. “We’ve got a great team and we gained a lot of experience out here this year. Our whole goal for this season was to prepare ourselves for 2005 and I think we’re ahead of schedule.”

A total of 38 cars qualified on time, including Keith Coleman Racing’s other entry the #50 Vassarette Chevrolet driven by Jennifer Jo Cobb, who qualified 28th. Casey Mears took the pole with a time of 30.348 seconds at 177.936 mph.

The Ford 300 will air on NBC at 1 p.m. EST on Saturday.