Daytona Beach, Fla. ? Kevin Harvick’s dismal season got a boost Friday when he won his first career pole position for a Winston Cup race, qualifying fastest for the Pepsi 400.

Harvick, who took over the car Dale Earnhardt drove after his death, circled the 2.5-mile Daytona track at 185.041 mph, a healthy 0.668 mph faster than second-place qualifier Geoffrey Bodine.

Defending Winston Cup champion Jeff Gordon (184.271) will go for his first victory of the season from the third position. Harvick’s Richard Childress Racing teammate, Robby Gordon, qualified fourth (184.268) for Saturday night’s race.

Harvick enters the traditional start of the second half of the season in 32nd place in the Winston Cup standings. He has only one top-5 finish, and has shown none of the promise he did last year when he took over for Earnhardt and won twice under extremely difficult circumstances.

The low point of his 2002 season came in April, when NASCAR “parked” Harvick, forbidding him to drive in the Virginia 500 as punishment for a confrontation with Coy Gibbs in a truck race.

In June, Childress tried to shake things up by flipping crews with Gordon’s team. Harvick also had a flare-up with Busch driver Greg Biffle, was fined $35,000 and is on probation through the 2002 season.

“It’s been a tough first half of the year,” said Harvick, who hasn’t spoken much with media since his problems began. “The last few weeks haven’t shown how much better things are going.

“But the team is here. We’re going to win races this year. There’s no need to talk about it. We’ll just show.”

Bodine, a restrictor-plate specialist, is running in only his fourth Winston Cup race of the season. He finished third in the Daytona 500.

Still, the favorites’ label belongs to Dale Earnhardt Inc., teammates Michael Waltrip, Steve Park and Dale Earnhardt Jr., who qualified seventh, eighth and ninth, respectively.

Earnhardt Jr. is the defending champion and has won three of the last four restrictor-plate races. Waltrip won the 2001 Daytona 500, giving DEI victories in four of the last six races run on NASCAR’s fastest tracks.