Chevy keeps up testing pace at Daytona.

Kyle Busch set the pace on day two of the latest Nextel Cup test at Daytona International Speedway, with Chevrolet again proving to be the marque to have as it dominated the time sheets.

Busch lapped in 188.119mph - a time of 47.842secs - to head the faster afternoon session at DIS, having been a solid third fastest behind Scott Riggs and Joe Nemechek before the mid-day break, despite having felt the effects of a strong breeze as the day wore on.

"It's going all right, but we've had a bunch of weird times coming up because it's so windy outside," the Kellogg's Chevrolet youngster said, "It's worse than yesterday, and it's not really giving us a good reading. But we have all the telemetry and such, so we can calculate what exactly the lap was from the wind speed and all that.

"The winds really picked during the afternoon session - but that's normal Daytona weather. Even with the gusts, we continued to make changes, trying to make the car faster and faster and getting the feel from it I need. Toward the end of the day, the winds slowed down a little, so we put the car almost in full qualifying trim to make a run and it happened to be the fastest of the day.

"We're pretty happy with our 'A' car in qualifying trim, so we'll probably just make a few runs with it in the pack on Wednesday and see how it reacts in the draft, make a couple of changes here and there and then put it away. Our back-up car will be the car we do most of our drafting with on Thursday, just in case something were to happen we wouldn't damage our primary car."

Behind Busch Jr, the Richard Childress Chevys of Clint Bowyer and Kevin Harvick both broke into the top five, moving ahead of Riggs, Nemechek and Jeff and David Green, who had filled the spots before lunch. Bowyer and Harvick both paid credit to engine changes for their march up the timesheets.

"I think our first two days have been pretty good," Bowyer reported, "I think the guys keep moving forward and making gains, the car keeps getting faster, and we are making a lot of motor changes just trying to find the right combination with the right car.

"I think they have come a long way, and it's a good testament to how hard they have been working, building these new race cars for this new team. We showed up and they were decent and we kept working on them. We had a list of things to improve - aero, chassis, all the things you go through - and also had a number of engines to go through. Once we kind of figured out the best car of the two, we put the best engine with that car and it made for a good package. I'm really excited about what we got."

Riggs' morning performance saw him lead Pre-season Thunder for the first time, but the #10 Dodge found itself pushed back to tenth in the faster afternoon session. Second fastest Nemechek suffered similarly, winding up eighth after the mid-day break, but was still content with his MB2 Chevy.

"By the time the afternoon session started, we felt pretty good about the baseline we had established, and thought it was time to start experimenting with different set-ups," he explained, "We learned a lot today and feel real good about coming back here next month. Once again, the MB2 engineering and fabrication departments have built stout superspeedway cars, and I'm looking forward to the draft. It might be a little tense at times, but it's also plenty of fun."

Fastest on Monday, MB2 team-mate Sterling Marlin found himself ranking sixth in Tuesday's morning practice and seventh in the afternoon.

"We had another good day," the veteran reported, "It just shows how good the guys in the shop are putting stuff together. We've been at the top of the speed charts consistently over the last two days, we've got fast cars and, if I can drive good and not make any mistakes, we'll be okay. I'm confident we can win a race this year and Daytona seems like a good place to start."

Another veteran, Dale Jarrett, led the Ford fightback with fourth fastest time in the afternoon session on Tuesday, with Jamie McMurray also on the pace, claiming eleventh in the morning.

Rookie Denny Hamlin broke back into the top ten times during the morning session, giving him an early boost in what looks to be an intriguing rookie title race.

"I think there's going to be even more emphasis on the rookies this year, as tough as a class it is," the FedEx Chevy driver confirmed, "I think to be rookie-of-the-year this year is probably going to take a top ten to top 15 points finish at the end of the year. You just can't slip up because you don't have one guy that you have got to beat, you have seven guys, eight guys. It's definitely going to be really tough.

"The guys race here different. You have got more time to work on things and get your car better, so it's going to be a great experience for everyone. I think I got into that #11 car at the optimum time. They had a lot of struggles toward the beginning of the year and, basically, when I got in it, they were just working some of the stuff out, trying to get caught back up on other cars. It made me look better than what I really am, maybe, I don't know. That's definitely a confidence booster."