Kyle Busch is better known as a closer than a qualifier. This week he’s hoping to do both as grabbed the pole for the Pocono 500 Sprint Cup race.
Making his 200th start in NASCAR’s senior series he’s won 18 races, but this was only his seventh pole. On a hot summer-like day Busch’s Toyota snagged the pole with a lap of 53.102 seconds or 169.485 mph. at the asymmetrical 2.5-mile triangular track. Clint Bowyer’s Chevrolet was temporarily on the pole with 169.138mph. Dale Earnhardt Jr. will start third and Busch’s older brother Kurt, winner last week in Charlotte will start fourth in a Dodge. The 2.5 mile track in Pennsylvania has been compared to a road course because of its’ tri-oval shape. "I think the biggest thing about the qualifying versus the racing here is that I can always be on top of the speed charts in practice," Busch said. "I can throw a lap together, but to continually do that during a run, during tire fall-off, during loss of fuel and the tires getting old, you really have to change what's going on,” explained the younger Busch brother. In ten previous starts here he has only two top-ten finishes. His best result was fourth in 2005 driving for Hendrick Motorsports. So it’s no surprise he’s looking to better his performance at this track. Busch added “ I’ve documented before that this is a place I struggle at. Running well here means a lot and having Dave (Rogers, crew chief) and the guys bring a great piece to the race track with a good car is fun because you can come around here and it can be really, really frustrating around this place because it is so long.” Bowyer admitted “Kyle is always fast. I don't know how fast he would have ran. It cooled off quite a bit. I really thought that the No. 42 (Montoya) and some of the others would be even faster behind him, but I think our lap stood out pretty good and I'm pretty excited about it." Terry Cook and Ted Musgrave (filling in for Robby Gordon who was racing in the Baja off-road event) failed to qualify.
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