Bristol starting lineup: Carl Edwards to start from pole position

BRISTOL, Tenn. — Carl Edwards will start where he finished at Bristol Motor Speedway: leading the field.

Edwards, who won the most recent race at the track, will start from the pole position for Saturday night's Bass Pro Shops NRA Night Race.

Rain fell Saturday afternoon and a thunderstorm threatened to arrive at Bristol and force a delay in the 8:13 p.m. ET scheduled race start. A competition caution will be called after 60 laps. UPDATE: After two attempts to run the race, NASCAR was forced to postpone it until 1 p.m. ET Sunday. However, it appeared rain would be a problem on Sunday as well..

Edwards admitted he was surprised by his starting position.

"A little bit surprising — we didn't make a mock run," he said. "That tells you how great of teammates I have. They're so fast and they helped us a lot, so we'll start where we started earlier this year. Hopefully we can put (our car) in victory lane, but this is going to be a heck of a race. Those are fast laps. That's a lot of fun. Just proud of my guys — they worked really hard. We rolled the dice and it was fast."

Denny Hamlin set a track record for qualifying in the opening round and will start alongside his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate. JGR's Kyle Busch will start third, with Ryan Blaney and Matt Kenseth rounding out the top five.

This is the fifth pole of the season for Edwards.

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In the session's first round, Greg Biffle spun early and had damage to the right rear of the car. It was the second spin of the day for Biffle, who endured a solo spin during the second practice session.

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Clint Bowyer also slid up the track and bounced off the wall in the session.

Jeff Gordon advanced to the final round for the first time since taking over in the No. 88 car for Dale Earnhardt Jr., who remains sidelined with concussion-like symptoms. Gordon will start 11th.

This might be Gordon's last race at Earnhardt's replacement. He said Friday he would not drive next week at Michigan, and Junior appears close to returning to his car.

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Chris Buescher also advanced to the final round. He has a win but needs to get into the top 30 in the standings in order to make the Chase for the Sprint Cup field. Buescher sits three points outside that group entering Saturday night's race. He will start 12th.

UPDATE: Michael Annett came up ill on Saturday and was replaced by Justin Allgaier in HScott Motorsports' No. 46 car.

Starting lineup

Sunday's green flag is expected about 1:15 p.m. ET.