RICHMOND, Va. – Mike Skinner made a surprising comeback after crashing in practice Friday and got his sixth career Winston Cup pole in a backup car at Richmond International Raceway.

The recovery was dramatic for Skinner, who called his run “a little bit of fuel for the soul.” But it also was short-lived. After winning the pole, his Pontiac went through some oil on the track in another practice session and slammed into the wall.

The race team, which has used several drivers since Jerry Nadeau was seriously injured in a crash during practice here in May, summoned a second backup car from Charlotte, N.C.

Maine driver Ricky Craven qualified in 35th.

Skinner, whose lap at 125.792 mph bumped Greg Biffle to the outside of the front row, will now start at the back of the field Saturday night in the Chevrolet 400.

Before his up and down day went steeply down again, Skinner joked with Nadeau about painting the car a different color just for Richmond.

“‘You didn’t make it through practice and I didn’t make it a lap before I tore the hell out of it,”‘ he told a laughing Nadeau, hospitalized for 31/2 weeks in Richmond after his accident May 2.

The laughs were harder to come by after the second crash.

“This is just my luck. We’re running out of cars,” Skinner said, guessing that he ran through oil dropped by teammate Johnny Benson.

But Benson’s team said the car wasn’t leaking.

Biffle lamented a wiggle in one of the turns after his lap at 125.646, saying he could have been faster. But as the session went on and his speed stood up, he began to think he might get the pole.

“Yeah, I did, and then I got really disappointed,” he said. “I left a fair amount out there, and it makes me feel bad that the guys worked so hard and we probably should have had the pole.”

Starting after the Ford of Biffle will be the Taurus of his Roush Racing teammate, Mark Martin. It was the fourth strong qualifying effort in five races for Martin, winless in his last 49 starts.

“I’m just happy to be close,” he said. “We’re close all the time and once in a while it’s your day. We’ve been close a lot here lately.”

Ryan Newman, who lead’s NASCAR’s top circuit with five victories and six poles, was next in a Dodge.

“We took an 18th-place car in practice and turned it into a fourth-place car,” he said.

After Newman came the Chevrolet of Jeff Gordon. Sterling Marlin was sixth-fastest in a Dodge, and Jeff Burton’s Ford gave Roush three of the top seven spots in the 43-car field.

“My car didn’t drive anything near as well as it did in practice,” Burton said. “We lost a lot of time off turn two and in the middle of three.”

The other two Roush cars, those of defending race champion and series points leader Matt Kenseth, and Kurt Busch, will start 18th and 25th.

Ward Burton, Benson and Kyle Petty completed the top 10.

Terry Labonte, who broke a four-year losing streak with a victory Sunday in the Southern 500, qualified 32nd.