Homestead, Fla. ? Tony Stewart made things even tougher for Mark Martin.

Winston Cup points leader Stewart qualified sixth Friday for the season-ending Ford 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, while Martin ” the only other driver with a shot at the championship ” will start 34th in the 43-car field. Kurt Busch won the pole.

Stewart leads Martin by 89 points and can clinch his first title by finishing 22nd or better in Sunday’s race, no matter what Martin does.

More bad news for Martin: Stewart won two of the three previous races at the track, after starting seventh and 13th.

“We had a good lap,” Stewart said. “We’re normally bad to the bone on Sunday here and our car is really, really good in race trim, so I’m pretty excited about Sunday now.”

The championship chase hasn’t gone down to the last race of a Winston Cup season since 1997, when Jeff Gordon beat Dale Jarrett by 14 points and Martin by 29 ” the closest three-way finish ever.

Martin, though, could get a bit of a reprieve before Sunday’s race. A National Stock Car Racing Commission panel will hear an appeal of the 25-point penalty he was given for an unapproved spring on his car in the Nov. 3 race at Rockingham, N.C. The three-person panel is scheduled to meet this morning, with a decision expected today.

If Martin gets all of the 25 points back on appeal ” which is considered unlikely ” Stewart would need to finish at least 13th to take the title, regardless of where Martin places.

Asked if he were concerned about the hearing, Martin said: “I have a race to get ready for. All I can do is the same thing I’ve been doing every race all year, go out and try to win the race.”

Bliss takes truck title

Homestead, Fla. ” Mike Bliss capped his return to NASCAR’s truck series by winning the championship Friday at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

Ron Hornaday, a former truck series champion, won the Ford 200 in a Chevrolet entered just this once as a teammate to Bliss. Polesitter Bliss finished fifth to win his first title.

Bliss celebrated by pulling his truck alongside that of Hornaday on the frontstretch and they high-fived through their windows. Bliss did the traditional burnouts, creating a thick burst of white smoke.

“This is unbelievable, Ron wins the race and we win the championship,” Bliss said. “That tells you how good this team is.

“When we started the year off, we had a bad race and we were way back in points, but we kept coming back. The team was good and I thought halfway through the year we could win the championship.”

Junqueira leads qualifying

Mexico City ” Bruno Junqueira in a Lola-Toyota guaranteed a front-row start for Sunday’s Mexico Grand Prix ” the final event of the CART season ” by leading the first day of qualifying with an average speed of 116.703 mph. The 200- mph stretch on the straightaway is tempered by 18 curves along the 2.786-mile track.