NSCS: Johnson Wins Pole at Phoenix

Jimmie Johnson won the pole yesterday afternoon for tomorrow’s 26th annual AdvoCare 500 with a fast time of 25.858 seconds, 139.222 mph. on his qualifying run. He also broke the track record that was set last year by Kyle Busch. Johnson was also the fastest yesterday in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Practice session.

“New track records are awesome.  I don’t qualify on pole all that often so I take great pride in them; especially track records,” said Johnson. “It’s a very cool of a deal.  It’s clearly at a great time in the season with the Chase and all that. We have a great pit pick and track position to start the race with.  Now we just need to be able to maintain that and make the right decisions during the race to keep track position.”

Denny Hamlin was second on the speed chart with a 25.895 seconds, 139.023 mph. He will make his 19th start inside the top-10 this season tomorrow at the Phoenix Raceway and his eighth at this track. Hamlin was just 0.037 seconds off of the pole time.

“Honestly, we didn’t get to spend that much time in qualifying because we were so bad when we unloaded,” said Hamlin. “We made some
huge strides to it. Every qualifying run we made we got a lot faster and obviously this is a testament to the adjustments we
made, and everything was obviously a whole lot better. Proud of that effort. I don’t think it will hold up for the pole, but I
think it will stand up for what I think will be a top-five position for us.”

Joey Logano posted the third fastest time on the board of the afternoon with a fast lap of 25.910 seconds, 138.942 mph. He will roll off in the top-10 for his 18th time this year in 2013. Logano was fifth on the board in practice.

“Yeah, I thought the lap was OK.  I didn’t think it was spectacular, but it’s gonna be a decent starting spot,” said Logano. “There are still a lot of fast cars to go, so we’ll see where we end up here.  Hopefully, it hangs in the top five and we get a good starting spot for this Shell/Pennzoil Ford.”

Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. was the highest qualifying rookie of the afternoon in the 27th spot.

 

Brett Winningham
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