Earnhardt Jr. Takes Daytona 500 Pole
By: Pete Pistone
Dale Earnhardt Jr. will start his 400th career Sprint Cup Series race from the pole when he takes the green flag for next Sunday’s Daytona 500.
Earnhardt grabbed the top spot for the 53rd running of “The Great American Race” by turning a lap of 186.089 mph in Sunday’s qualifying session.
It was the 1oth pole of Earnhardt’s Sprint Cup Series career and his first in 23 attempts at Daytona.
The last driver to win the Daytona 500 from the pole was Dale Jarrett in 2000.
“The main thing it does for me is it takes a lot of pressure off for the qualifier,” Earnhardt said of Thursday’s Gatorade Duel at Daytona Twin 150 mile races. “I can just go out there and have fun and try to just have fun winning the race. I don't have to worry about where I need to finish to get a good starting spot of the 500. We can just go out and try to have fun and win that thing and try to bring all the hardware home this week."
With the number one starting spot wrapped up, can Earnhardt win his second career Daytona 500?
“About 30 of us can,” Earnhardt laughed. “Hopefully I make all the right moves, man. We’ve got a long week, but I’m really proud of the speed we had today and I want to thank everybody that worked on the car. It’s a really good race car.”
He’ll be joined on the front row by his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jeff Gordon, who turned in a lap of 185.966 mph.
“I’m so proud of these guys,” said Gordon, who will make his first start with new crew chief Alan Gustafson in next Sunday’s race. “I know everybody talks about how hard you work, but these guys just pay so much attention to detail. And that’s why they’ve been on the front row here the last couple of years.”
Only the front row is locked in for Sunday’s race with the remainder of the 43-car field determined by qualifying speeds, finishing positions in Thursday’s Gatorade Duel at Daytona Twin 150-mile races, the Top 35 in last year’s owners’ points and provisionals.
Nineteen-year-old Trevor Bayne, who does have a guaranteed spot in the Daytona 500, drove the Wood Brothers Racing Ford to the third fastest time.
“I can’t thank this Wood Brothers team enough and everybody at Ford Racing and Roush Yates for giving us a car like this to bring here,” said Bayne. “Obviously, we were praying a lot before we went out there, so we got a good run. The winds were kind of calm and I think this will show everybody that we’ve got an awesome race car and they can work with us in these twins coming into Thursday.”
Paul Menard, making his debut as a member of the Richard Childress Racing camp, qualified fourth with Clint Bowyer rounding out the top five.
Jeff Burton was sixth to give RCR three drivers in the first ten with Ryan Newman, Mark Martin, Greg Biffle and Tony Stewart completing the top 10.
Chevrolet had eight positions inside the top ten.
Four other drivers earned a berth in the Daytona 500 after the session although starting spots will not be known until after Thursday’s races: Bill Elliott, Joe Nemechek, Travis Kvapil and Terry Labonte.
Daytona International Speedway will be dark on Monday and Tuesday with practice resuming on Wednesday. Thursday’s Gatorade Duel at Daytona is slated to begin at 2 p.m. ET.