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| Joey Logano was the fastest car in NASCAR Sprint Cup practice on Friday at Pocano. |
The surest bet in all of world-wide sports on Saturday is that someone will break the NASCAR Sprint Cup track qualifying record at Pocono Raceway.
Indeed, you can be fairly certain that, weather notwithstanding, two or
three dozen drivers will break the record in morning qualifying for
Sunday afternoon's Pocono 400 at the 2.5-mile track.
The
evidence became pretty convincing on Friday afternoon, when 42 drivers
practiced faster than the existing track record. Earlier in the day, 40
drivers practiced faster than Kasey Kahne's eight-year-old record of
172.533 miles per hour. Toyota driver Joey Logano
set the pace in the afternoon session at 179.501 miles per hour, the
fastest lap in three test sessions over Wednesday and Thursday, and the
two practice sessions on Friday. Speeds are up because the three-sided
track was repaved in the spring, adding what drivers call “tons of grip”
on a table-smooth surface.
Ford driver Carl Edwards was
second-fastest at 179.361 mph, then defending race champion Jeff Gordon
at 179.108 mph in his Chevrolet. Chevy driver Paul Menard was fourth at
178.798 mph and Toyota driver Kyle Busch fifth at 178.540 mph. Kahne,
Biffle, Brad Keselowski (winner of last July's race here), AJ
Allmendinger and Marcos Ambrose completed the top-10.
The
first driver not over the track record in the afternoon session was Reed
Sorenson at 171.246 mph, good only for 43rd, but still ahead of Tony
Raines. Top-10 in the morning session were Mark Martin, Jamie McMurray,
Dale Earnhardt Jr., Jimmie Johnson, Allmendinger, Ryan Newman, Kahne,
Tony Stewart, Denny Hamlin and Regan Smith. Only David Gilliland, Scott
Riggs, Raines and Reed Sorenson were slower than the track qualifying
record.
Despite the dramatic increase in speeds, Johnson
doesn't seem especially concerned about Sunday's race. “It's going to be
fast for sure, but the comfort is there in the cars and that's why
we're able to lay down these laps,” he said. “The tire is holding up,
and that speaks to the tire/asphalt combination and how important that
those two materials agree with one another. We're in the gas a long
time, and the corner that's most apparent for that is turn three.
“We're
in the throttle well before we see any part of the straightaway. We
certainly are getting in the corners deeper and rolling in the center
faster, but the thing that stands out the most is how soon you're to
wide-open again. Then, if you're shifting, how quickly you need to grab
fourth (gear). It's a considerable change from last year, when we were
shifting.”
More praise for repaving job
Sprint
Cup point-leader Greg Biffle weighed in Friday afternoon with his
praise for the recent Pocono repaving. Cup teams tested on the track
Wednesday and Thursday, practice twice on Friday, will qualify on
Saturday morning and run their 160-lap, 400-mile race on Sunday
afternoon.
Many have praised the repave, but few as
quaintly as Biffle. “They did a phenomenal job with this paving,” he
said. “I'm just amazed at the roads we drive on on the highway, then we
come here at these big race tracks – Talladega was the first one and
then Daytona Beach and now here – and they're just glass-smooth at 200
miles an hour. It just fascinates me on how they can do that, and my
hat's off to them. I think it'll bring some life back to this track.
It's definitely gonna be exciting, and I think all the drivers enjoy the
surface so far.”
Later, perhaps mindful of how it sounded,
Biffle revisited his “life back” comment. “I think 'excitement' is
probably a better word than 'life,' ” he said. “With these cars, we were
trying to get the splitter 1/32nd-inch off the ground all the way
around and you went down into turn one and there were big bumps. The car
was bouncing up in the air, so we were trying to balance out the car
hopping and bouncing on the old track to the grip.
“It was
just hard, like the track didn't really match up to our cars as well as
it does now. Now, we can really traditionally work on our cars because
it's so smooth and we can work on our splitter and swaybars and springs
and shocks and all that good stuff. Before, it was hard to work on your
car and get it to do what you wanted it to do.”
Poole wins pole for ARCA race
Brennan
Poole is now 2-for-2 in ARCA pole qualifying at Pocono Raceway. He
qualified fastest last June and backed it on Friday, when he set the
series track record in qualifying for Saturday afternoon's 80-lap,
200-mile race. His 173.554 miles per hour lap shattered Kyle Busch's
nine-year-old series record of 170.849 mph at the 2.5-mile, three-sided
track. It also broke Kasey Kahne's five-year-old Sprint Cup qualifying
record of 172.533 mph.
Toyota teammate Kevin Swindell was
second at 172.765 mph lap, with Chevrolet driver Chad Hackenbracht third
at 171.530 mph. Chevy driver Matt Lofton was fourth at 170.729 mph and
Toyota driver Frank Kimmel fifth at 170.564 mph. Ryan Reed, Alex Bowman,
Jared Marks, Chris Buescher and Nelson Canache completed the top-10.
The difference in Poole's pole-winning lap and 31st-starting James
Hylton's lap was more than 31 miles per hour, with three other drivers
needing provisionals top make the 34-car grid.
Saturday at Pocono Raceway
11:10, full-field Sprint Cup qualifying; 1:30, start of 80-lap, 200-mile ARCA race
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