When qualifying officially opened at 6:30 p.m., May 3rd SCSS runner-up Dan Shipley was in the second pair out. The turbocharged 334-inch Mustang from Marthasville, MO, made its first attempt with an easy 10.68 at only 106 mph. Grote's red big block Chevy (which had been driven to the track from St. Peters, MO, with refitted mufflers) then posted the first "big number" with a great 9.897 at 137 mph...and the fireworks began. Brett Heidgerken, making his first appearance with a 505-cubic inch 1967 Chevelle from Decatur, IL, hit a brilliant 9.91/135 to keep pace, followed by Gentry's first of two required 1000-foot passes at 9.93/117. Grote's second attempt was a sub-par 10.20/131, but Gentry's fourth licensing shut-off run was a 9.894/120, which stole the pole back from Grote. The Mercury only held the lead for ten minutes; Heidgerken came back with a 9.865/138.60 to claim the lead. A half-hour later, Gentry put the Comet back on top with his first full-throttle licensing run, a great 9.796/134. Heidgerken's Chevelle took a shot and missed with a 9.830 at a whopping 139.34 mph, but retained the second qualifying spot. Shipley's Mustang also came close, hitting a 10.02 at a tremendous 141.74 mph.

With qualifying rapidly coming to a close, Tony Huff's Belleville-based '68 Camaro (which had earlier hit a best-ever 11.18/119) lost a radiator hose on the starting line directly ahead of Grote, who waited patiently for the clean-up. The GIR crew decided to use every available tool, including torches, rosin, traction compound, and the rubber grinder, to bring back adhesion. On a 91-degree surface, Grote's Camaro pulled up for one last shot at qualifying and immediately proved the track crew's worth. After what easily was the highest wheelstand in SCSS Series history, Grote landed and charged to a career-best 9.703 at 138.61 mph to become the first competitor ever to take three consecutive pole qualifying positions!

Incredibly, the big numbers didn't end with qualifying. Gentry returned for his last licensing pass before the final round and stunned the crowd with a 9.422 at 140.39 mph which included astonishing 5.97/115 eighth-mile numbers. That run paled, however, to Heidgerken's final effort. Although it came after the conclusion of qualifying, the bronze Chevelle drew the loudest cheers of the event with an ungodly 9.344 at an even more amazing 149.28 mph, a speed which would've been a new SCSS Series record had it been recorded sixteen minutes earlier! The effort also gave the Decatur pilot the honors of clocking the first 120 mph eighth-mile speed (with a 6.06 ET) in Tuesday night history.

When Grote and Gentry pulled into the waterbox for the final run, the Chevy was the decided underdog. When the '65 Comet left the starting line a mere twenty-one thousandths of a second before the green light, few fans noticed the foul. All eyes were on Grote's Camaro, which headed for the sky on an even higher wheelstand, crashing to the ground in a shower of sparks more than a hundred feet off the line and leaping into a second moonshot, all while Grote kept his foot to the firewall and wrestled the car away from the wall. "I could feel it going to the left," Grote said after the win, "but it was still in the air so I couldn't see anything. The landing was rough, but I had no idea he redlighted, so I had to stay in the throttle. I can't believe the thing still went 9.88 at 138 all over the track and in-and-out of the gas!" Grote will head to the HOT ROD Magazine Pump Gas Drags in Memphis, TN, with the same car with hopes of going even quicker. "I drove it here tonight because I have to drive a 35-mile course in Memphis, and I wanted to see it if would overheat. It was 180 degrees all the way, so I'm happy. That 1.38 sixty-foot time made me even happier!" For Gentry, who shut down before the finish line to a coasting 9.60/117, the Festus racer can still claim an unbelievable 5.91/117 eighth-mile effort on the final pass. Grote's win has allowed Chevrolet to move ahead of Ford, three wins to two, in the 2005 Manufacturers' Championship.

The two quickest six-cylinder entries qualified only one thousandth of a second apart. For the second week in a row, Mark Brokaw's Granite City '87 Buick Grand National had the best ET in qualifying at 12.724/111.69, followed by the 12.725/118.08 of Jason Ebenrick's Festus-based '97 Toyota Supra. After the official qualifying period, however, Ebenrick finally got the straight-six turbo car to leave the line without bogging or spinning, hitting an exceptional 12.09 at 121.44 mph. Another impressive post-qualifying effort came from David Perry's '85 351 Mustang; after an 11.59/119 official effort, Perry returned to run 11.40 at 129.84, a speed which makes the St. Louis Ford, unofficially, among the eight fastest of the 2005 SCSS season.