David Gilliland will start on the pole in Saturday’s Coke Zero 400 at the Daytona International Speedway after rain washed out the remaining two rounds of knockout qualifying. Gilliland earned the pole for Saturday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race after turning a quick lap of 45.153 seconds, 199.322 mph. The pole today marks his third in the series since joining in 2007 and hopes it’ll lead him to his first career victory in the Sprint Cup series. This will certainly give him and the team momentum to go earn his first career win on Saturday.
Reed Sorenson will start the Coke Zero 400 on Saturday from the second spot after posting a best time of 45.176 seconds, 199.221 mph. This will be his best starting spot since the 2007 event at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway where he earned the pole. With three qualifying sessions complete on plate tracks in 2014, this will be Sorenson’s first top-10 start of the year. This, like Gilliland, will give the team plenty of momentum to possibly capture the win at Daytona to earn his first win in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series. Sorenson was 0.023 seconds slower than the time set by Gilliland.
Starting from third is another driver who most wasn’t expecting to start up inside the top-10 and that was Landon Cassill. Cassill posted a fast time of 45.182 seconds, 199.194 mph. in the one and only round of cup qualifying this afternoon. This qualifying effort will be the best starting spot in his young NASCAR Sprint Cup Series career since 2011 at the Talladega Superspeedway where he started in sixth. This will be the first time in 2014 where he started from inside the top-10. He was 0.029 seconds off of the pole sitter’s fastest time.
The one and only qualifying round we saw this afternoon had no incidents unlike earlier in the day with the NASCAR Nationwide Series.
About Me: Brett has been following the sport of NASCAR since the beginning of the 2006 NASCAR Sprint Cup season. Since Brett was 13, he has had a passion of chasing a job in sports that not many get the opportunity of doing. He has been in the NASCAR media since the middle of the 2010 season. Since then, he has been a part of many racing podcast shows to improve his talents. He has written for racingonfuel.com and theracingwheel.com. Currently, Brett writes for motorsportsnat.com and TracksideChatter.com. You can find him on twitter @NASCAR_Brett.
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