KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) – Christopher Bell won the pole Saturday for the third consecutive NASCAR Cup Series race at Kansas Speedway, giving him the best possible starting position as he tries to advance to the second round of the playoffs.
Bell turned in a blistering, even-keeled lap of 179.336 mph in the pole shootout. That put him in the front row for Sunday’s race with Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Ty Gibbs, who was eliminated from the playoffs a week ago.
“We showed up with probably the best Kansas car we’ve ever had,” said Bell, who finished in the top 10 in the last two races at Kansas but never converted one of those brilliant positions. from start to victory.
“It’s always been a great track for us to qualify for and when we race we’re in that range from third to seventh,” Bell said, “but today was different. It was really good at the practice I was able to drive the car and we were able to replicate it in qualifying.
Defending Kansas playoff winner Tyler Reddick will start third alongside Kyle Busch, the only other non-playoff driver to advance to the first round of qualifying. Reddick held off Denny Hamlin to win in overtime last fall.
“Practice was a little tough for us, but I think we made some good adjustments,” Reddick said. “We had to go a long way to get the pace we needed in qualifying… but I’ll definitely take it.”
The remainder of the top 10 consisted of drivers entering the round of 16 still alive in the playoffs. William Byron finished fifth with Hamlin, whose four wins at Kansas are the most of any driver, starting sixth. Daniel Suarez, Joey Logano, Ryan Blaney and Chase Briscoe — whose wife, Marissa, is back home as the couple expects to welcome twins any day now — round out the top 10.
Kyle Larson, who dominated last week’s race at Bristol, was the fastest to fail to qualify for the second round and will start 11th, alongside compatriot Alex Bowman. Austin Cindric qualified 17th on a warm, sunny day in Kansas.
Chase Elliott will have the most work to do. He had engine problems during testing, and radioed to his team that he thought he had dropped a cylinder. He qualified and qualified, but the team will change engines and he will start from the back on Sunday.
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AP Auto Racing: https://apnews.com/hub/auto-racing
