HAMPTON, Ga. -- Dale Earnhardt Jr. earned his first pole in nearly two years Friday night at Atlanta Motor Speedway with the fastest lap ever run by the current car.

The fastest lap the car, adopted in 2007, had run in qualifying was 192.376 mph last fall at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Friday night, Dale Earnhardt Jr. won the pole with a lap of 192.761 mph.

The achievement pales to what Earnhardt seeks to do on race day after finishing a career-worst 25th in the points last year.

"The changes we made [in the offseason] are definitely what we needed,'' Earnhardt said. "I'm real happy with this performance and how we qualified at Daytona, how we qualified at Vegas is really good for us and builds a lot of confidence. I'm just hoping to see this difference on the car on Sunday.

"I think we will. It's just a matter of time if we keep performing like this. We made a lot of changes. We tried to make the right ones in the offseason and sort of forget about what happened last year and try to come into this season with a renewed sense of confidence.''

Kyle Busch starts second after a lap of 192.280 mph. He's followed by Juan Pablo Montoya (192.106 mph), Mark Martin (191.814) and Jeff Gordon (191.774).

Chevrolet took four of the top five spots.

A new tire by Goodyear and cool evening temperatures were among the reasons given for the higher speeds in qualifying.

"It's crazy how fast it is,'' Montoya said about the speeds.

Track mogul Bruton Smith speaks out

Bruton Smith, whose Speedway Motorsports Inc., operates seven tracks, including Atlanta Motor Speedway, that host Cup races, said that drivers need to be more aggressive, changes need to be made to the purse and that the Chase might need to be dumped.

Asked about driver rivalries, Smith said: "We need rubbing, somebody that is not afraid to stand on it or do a little rubbing and bumping. You've got some of them out there. You've got Tony [Stewart]. He's good. You don't need a bunch of goody two-shoes out there that's being concerned about everything.

"The greatest thing in the world right now is if Sunday when the race is over Jimmie Johnson got out of the car and slapped somebody. That would sell a lot of tickets. That's the kind of stuff I would like to see.''

Smith also contends that the difference between first- and second-place in prize money should increase to encourage harder racing for wins. He also said that half the point fund money should be put into the purse to make this happen.

Asked if he would eliminate the Chase, Smith said: "I'm not saying that we do that yet, but that might be in the future because we've got to get rid of this point racing crap. If it takes that, then do it. Let's make racing better. Let's put the money out there and go racing.''

Tough loss

Jeff Gordon admits it took him a couple of days to get over losing last weekend's race at Las Vegas.

Gordon led all but 48 of the 267 laps but finished third after making a two-tire change on his last pit stop. Race winner Johnson had four tires changed.

"I was pretty angry about that one,'' Gordon said.

"By Tuesday or Wednesday, I was finally starting to get over it. I feel like we did everything we could as a team. I'm very happy with the results of how we performed, but it was a tough loss."