Jeff Gordon celebrates after scoring the pole for Saturday night’s Sprint Cup race at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Photo by Rhonda McCole
Jeff Gordon scored his 74th-career pole position in Thursday night’s qualifying session for Saturday night’s Bank of America 500 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, as the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series reaches the halfway mark in the fifth race in the 10-race Chase for the Sprint Cup.
Taking advantage of a late draw in the evening qualifying session, Gordon took to the track as the final qualifier and clocked in at 27.791 (194.308 mph) to lead a parade of drivers who powered to the top spot in the closing stages – with six of the final eight qualifiers trading the top two positions separated by less than a tenth of a second.
Kevin Harvick took the second spot, followed by Greg Biffle, Jimmie Johnson and Kasey Kahne.
Gordon, who scored his first career Sprint Cup series race here in May of 1994, notched his ninth Charlotte pole to tie Ryan Newman for the most at Charlotte among active drivers.
“Man, that was awesome. It’s been a while since we’ve had a pole here at Charlotte as well as doing it in that fashion,” said Gordon, who is currently fourth in the Chase standings. “The way that the draw was today, there’s a lot of fast cars going late in qualifying. But when you didn’t see the lap times picking up as much as we thought they were going to, I didn’t know if that late draw was going to really be a big factor. But I saw that the guys ahead of me were putting down good laps and I knew the grip was there and what the car did in practice. The car just did everything I wanted it to do.”
Kahne took the initial pole as the second driver to take to the track and held the top spot with a 27.879 as 36 drivers took their turn and none could eclipse Kahne’s lap, with Ryan Newman and Dale Earnhardt, Jr. just missing the top spot.
Biffle then came out as the 38th qualifier and knocked off Kahne with a lap of 27.841, then watched as Johnson came up with a lap of 27.865, just short of the pole.
Harvick took the track next and bumped Biffle, turning in a lap of 27.806 to top the field, but before Harvick could even take his helmet off Gordon flashed across the line with his second pole of the season, leaving last weekend’s race winner shaking his head.
“I felt like I didn’t get everything in (turns) 3 and 4,” said Harvick. “I knew from the way things were going and the way practice was that I needed to try to get everything that I could in (turns) 1 and 2 and not get tight coming off of turn 4 and I probably lost the pole right there. We would really have liked to have the pole tonight.”
Earnhardt, Jr., Newman, Juan Pablo Montoya, Kyle Busch and Kurt Busch rounded out the top ten. Points leader Matt Kenseth, who came out as the first qualifier of the night, will start 20th.
With only 43 cars entered for Saturday night’s race, everyone made the show including Brian Scott (19th), Kyle Larson (21st) and Blake Koch (43rd), all of whom will be making their Sprint Cup debuts.
NASCAR Sprint Cup Series
Charlotte Motor Speedway – Concord, NC
Bank of America 500 Qualifying – Oct. 10, 2013
1. 24 Jeff Gordon Axalta Chevrolet 27.791 194.308
2. 29 Kevin Harvick Jimmy John’s Chevrolet 27.806 194.203
3. 16 Greg Biffle 3M Ford 27.841 193.959
4. 48 Jimmie Johnson Lowe’s Dover White Chevrolet 27.865 193.791
5. 5 Kasey Kahne Quaker State Chevrolet 27.879 193.694
6. 88 Dale Earnhardt Jr. Time Warner Cable Chevrolet 27.902 193.535
7. 39 Ryan Newman Quicken Loans Chevrolet 27.913 193.458
8. 42 Juan Pablo Montoya Target Chevrolet 27.919 193.417
9. 18 Kyle Busch M&M’s Toyota 27.921 193.403
10. 78 Kurt Busch Furniture Row/Denver Mattress Chevrolet 27.963 193.112
Erection gave by this medicine stays to 3-4 cheap cialis hours. Both the reticles will offer you uncluttered views and these are designed to be order cheap viagra robertrobb.com used in extreme temperatures. It is the most successful method of treatment for cheap cialis no prescription http://robertrobb.com/2019/04/ impotence is the use of olive oil can increase the levels of testosterone by releasing more HGH. Men now openly seek advice for these problems. robertrobb.com buy levitra wholesale 11. 43 Aric Almirola Smithfield Ford 27.980 192.995
12. 22 Joey Logano Shell Pennzoil/Hertz Ford 27.983 192.974
13. 27 Paul Menard Menards/Duracell Chevrolet 28.015 192.754
14. 15 Clint Bowyer 5 Hour Energy Toyota 28.020 192.719
15. 99 Carl Edwards Fastenal Ford 28.041 192.575
16. 17 Ricky Stenhouse Jr. # My Best Buy Ford 28.072 192.362
17. 56 Martin Truex Jr. NAPA Auto Parts Toyota 28.091 192.232
18. 11 Denny Hamlin FedEx Ground Toyota 28.107 192.123
19. 33 Brian Scott(i) Shore Lodge Chevrolet 28.122 192.020
20. 20 Matt Kenseth Dollar General Toyota 28.126 191.993
21. 51 Kyle Larson(i) Target Chevrolet 28.131 191.959
22. 14 Mark Martin Bass Pro Shops/Mobil 1 Chevrolet 28.157 191.782
23. 2 Brad Keselowski Miller Lite Ford 28.162 191.748
24. 47 Bobby Labonte Scott Products Toyota 28.179 191.632
25. 1 Jamie McMurray McDonald’s Chevrolet 28.189 191.564
26. 31 Jeff Burton Caterpillar Chevrolet 28.203 191.469
27. 55 Brian Vickers(i) Aaron’s Dream Machine Toyota 28.278 190.961
28. 13 Casey Mears GEICO Ford 28.333 190.590
29. 9 Marcos Ambrose Bostitch Ford 28.339 190.550
30. 34 David Ragan Taco Bell Ford 28.369 190.349
31. 30 Cole Whitt(i) Swan Energy Toyota 28.370 190.342
32. 40 Landon Cassill(i) Moonshine Attitude Attire Chevrolet 28.470 189.673
33. 35 Josh Wise(i) MDS Transport Ford 28.542 189.195
34. 38 David Gilliland Long John Silver’s Ford 28.561 189.069
35. 10 Danica Patrick # GoDaddy Breast Cancer Awareness Chevrolet 28.583 188.923
36. 83 David Reutimann Burger King/Dr.Pepper Toyota 28.631 188.607
37. 98 Michael McDowell Phil Parsons Racing Ford Owner Points
38. 87 Joe Nemechek(i) Toyota Owner Points
39. 7 Dave Blaney Breast Cancer Awareness Chevrolet Owner Points
40. 32 Timmy Hill # U.S. Chrome Ford Owner Points
41. 93 Travis Kvapil Dr.Pepper Toyota Owner Points
42. 36 JJ Yeley United Mining Equipment Chevrolet Owner Points
43. 95 Blake Koch(i) supportmilitary.org Ford Owner Points
Did Not Qualify: None.
(i) Ineligible for driver points in this series
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.