TALLADEGA- Three-time Sprint Cup champion Jimmie Johnson will start from the pole position at the Amp Energy 500 today as qualifying was rained out on Saturday.

NASCAR qualifying rain out rules states that the top 35 positions are set according to owner points. Chase drivers will start in the top 12 positions, exactly as they currently stand in the points standings.

This is Johnson’s fourth pole of the season and he holds a 118-point lead over Mark Martin, who will start beside him on Row 1.

“It’ll give us a chance to try to get five points, which is nice,” Johnson said. “The safest place is leading. So if we’re able to stay up front, and ride around up there for a long time, to do it the whole race would be great. But there is so much here that is so out of control with not only the crashing aspect that we’ve all been talking about, but the draft and how impatient guys are going to want to be in the lead lap.”

Marin is looking to pick up his third win at the Talladega Superspeedway. He is excited about being in the front row in today’s race.

“I’m thrilled to be in the front row,” Martin said. “It’s the kind of honor that you enjoy when you accumulate the kind of success we have (this season). I’m proud of what we’ve accomplished, and that puts us on the front row here.”

The last time that Johnson and Martin started on the front row at Talladega it did not end the way Martin wanted. Martin, who has 10 top 10 finishes at Talladega, didn’t finish the race that day due to problems with his steering box.

“It was some kind of phenomenon that happen with the steering box where when you turned left, if you turn it back real quick, it would lock,” Martin said. ”And it wouldn’t unlock until you turned left again. It looked really crazy, but I almost hit the inside of the wall down here before I finally released the pressure and I don’t know. It still did it in the race. I just never got in that particular situation. But pit stops, when I would turn right real quick, it would still lock. And it would still do it when you got back to the shop. If you took it left and then shoved it right, it would lock and wouldn’t unlock until you let pressure off of it.”

Jeff Gordon will start third today in the AMP Energy 500. Gordon has been successful in Talladega, winning six times at the 2.66-mile track. He hopes that he will be able to add another victory to his total today.

“Well, we certainly hope so,” Gordon said. “The last few times we’ve been here haven’t quite gone our way, but that’s the way it sort of seems to be here at Talladega. It’s sort of feast or famine. I feel good. The car was great yesterday.

“We were sort of anticipating the rain today and we didn’t do any qualifying runs and I think had we had to do one today, we certainly wouldn’t be anywhere close to third. This is certainly a positive for us and a great way to get the weekend started and we’ll just kind of see where it goes from there.”

Tony Stewart who won the race last fall with start fourth while Juan Pablo Montoya, Kurt Busch, Ryan Newman, Greg Biffle, Denny Hamlin, Carl Edwards, Kasey Kahne and Brian Vickers round out the positions of the Chase drivers.

Fan favorite Dale Earnhardt Jr. will roll off 24th.

The AMP Energy 500 begins at noon today at Talladega Superspeedway.