"It's amazing," said Carpentier, who took his first pole on an oval track with a fast lap was 129.776 mph. "The car was great. We made a couple of changes from this morning and the car just rotated beautifully through the middle of the corner. It was just stuck on the track. I'm real happy.
"Honestly, if I had won the first pole on a road course I wouldn't be as happy," he added. "I want to do well on the ovals because that is where they do most the racing in this series."
The rain began while series points leader Kyle Busch, the 24th driver in the 45-car qualifying line, was on the mile oval. He completed one lap that was good for 16th best at that point before officials called him in.
The time trials were delayed for 1 hour, 54 minutes before resuming with Busch given a second chance to qualify, this time on a dry track. He was quicker, but still wound up 27th overall.
Although the track was very slick and there was little rubber remaining after the rain, several cars were faster than Reed Sorenson, the leader before the rain delay with a speed of 128.828 mph.
Kevin Harvick followed Busch onto the track and, despite nearly hitting the wall on his fast lap, took over the top spot with a lap of 128.976. Bobby Labonte then went out and took the top spot from Harvick with a lap of 129.059.
Labonte, a former Cup champion who hasn't won a pole since April 2004, was pretty happy with the outside spot on the front row for Sunday's race.
"I was pleasantly surprised," he said. "I didn't think it was going to be that fast with the track conditions what they were, so we' excited to get a good lap and get a good starting spot."
