Vickers, who went out 10th in qualifying, topped the speed charts at 127.131 m.p.h. in his No.83 Red Bull Racing Toyota. It was his second Sprint Cup Series pole of the season and the seventh of his career.

"We were definitely not where we wanted to be in practice," Vickers said. "I'm really proud of the Red Bull guys. They made a bunch of great changes within the practices. Unfortunately, we didn't make those changes until we got into qualifying trim, so we were not able to experiment on the race trim."

Vickers' first career Cup pole came in the spring race at Richmond during his 2004 rookie season, when he set the track qualifying record, driving the No.25 Chevrolet for Hendrick Motorsports.

Jeff Gordon qualified 0.05 seconds behind Vickers to grab the outside pole, marking the 11th time he will start on the front row at Richmond.

"We really didn't unload off the truck very good," Gordon said. "We were struggling with the race runs. We finally started to hit on some things, and the car started to come to life, right on our last run. We put in the qualifying trim, and it was fast right away, and we just kept tuning on it."

Denny Hamlin, from nearby Chesterfield, Virginia, was third. Hamlin started on the pole and led 381 of 400 laps at Richmond one year ago. He ended up finishing 24th after a late-race tire problem put him out of contention.

"We've been really close here at this track, but have never quite been there at the end," Hamlin said. "I think if any (track) owes me one, this one definitely does. It would mean a lot to win here."

Martin Truex Jr. and Jeff Burton rounded out the top-five.

Mike Bliss qualified sixth in the James Finch-owned No.09 Chevrolet. Brad Keselowski drove that car to victory in last weekend's race at Talladega. Keselowski is not coming in the Cup event at Richmond.

Mark Martin, Scott Speed, David Reutimann and Ryan Newman were seventh through 10th, respectively, in qualifying.

Other notable drivers and their starting positions include: Kyle Busch (14th) Jimmie Johnson (15th), Tony Stewart (16th), Dale Earnhardt Jr. (25th) and Carl Edwards (37th).

Todd Bodine and Trevor Boys failed to qualify.

Saturday's race is scheduled to start around 7:30 p.m. (et).