Briscoe claims pole for Daytona 500
Today at 11:37 PM
Chase Briscoe and Austin Cindric locked down the front row of the Daytona 500 as the fastest two drivers on Wednesday night in qualifying.
Briscoe earned the pole – his second at Daytona International Speedway, but first in the Daytona 500 – with a lap of 182.745 mph (49.249 seconds). It is Briscoe's third career pole in the NASCAR Cup Series, and comes in his first points race with Joe Gibbs Racing driving the No. 19 Toyota.
It is the first pole in the Daytona 500 for Toyota.
"A great way to start our season," Briscoe said. "Unbelievable way to start off the year. Unbelievable way to start off with Toyota. To be able to be the guy to deliver them the first anything when they’ve already accomplished so much is pretty cool. Man, to think I’m going to start on the pole of the great American race with ultimately the great American brand of Bass Pro Shops is unbelievable.
"I can’t thank Coach Gibbs enough, the entire Joe Gibbs Racing organization. The whole off-season, everybody kept telling me the focus was trying to qualify better at superspeedways. That’s something I really struggled at last year. For our 19 group to come here and sit on the pole at the biggest race of the year is pretty special. I can’t believe it; super appreciative of this opportunity with Bass Pro, Toyota, Joe Gibbs. Unbelievable way to start our season. Hopefully, we can carry it on now."
Cindric qualified second. The Team Penske driver put down a lap of 182.463 mph in his Ford Mustang.
Wednesday determined the front row for the 67th annual Daytona 500. The session was two rounds of single-car qualifying with the fastest 10 drivers advancing to the second round to compete for the front row.
Briscoe and Cindric led the way over Ryan Preece, Joey Logano, and Josh Berry. Denny Hamlin was sixth followed by Austin Dillon, Christopher Bell, Ty Dillon, and Kyle Larson.
"It’s obviously a huge credit to the guys on the 2 car, building a really fast race car, a lot of fast Fords in the field," Cindric said. "It's really cool. Starting pole would be better. Chase and I haven’t compared race results in our entire career, just take jabs at each other for qualifying results. This one is going to sting for a while. Congratulations to him and Coach and those guys.
"It's pretty good to start on the front row with one of my good friends. All in all, a great box was checked for the start of this week. I think every single part of this weekend is important to setting up with an opportunity to win this race on Sunday. That’s another one: pit selection. Obviously controlling your destiny at the start of the race. We’ll try to do the best we can to learn about our car tomorrow night."
All other drivers will go into the twin qualifying duel races Thursday night to determine the starting lineup for the Daytona 500. However, two drivers, Martin Truex Jr. and Jimmie Johnson, know they will have starting spots, although where they are on the grid is still to be determined.
Truex and Johnson were the fastest two Open drivers in qualifying to lock into the field. Truex was 22nd fastest overall and Johnson was 29th.
Helio Castroneves, who has the Open Exemption Provisional to fall back on, was 39th in qualifying.
NEXT: The twin qualifying duel races at 7 p.m. ET Thursday.
