Qualifying Tag

By Luis Torres, Staff Writer SONOMA, California — Last year’s road racer surprise in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series West has now become the fastest man in ‘Wine Country’ as Will Rodgers put up a flying run of 1:19.081 (90.591 mph), and will lead the field to the green flag in Saturday’s Carneros 200 at Sonoma Raceway. Rodgers’s No. 7 Kelly & Assoc. Insurance Group Ford outperformed Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series rookie William Byron by 0.467 seconds (.532 mph), creating the “Will and Will Show” on Row 1. RodgersRead More

By Luis Torres, Staff Writer Wintry conditions was the word around the NASCAR garage Saturday instead of spring climate and racing action, as both the Camping World Truck Series race and Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series qualifying have been impacted by inclement weather. With weather being a concern, the Alpha Energy Solutions 250 truck race started several minutes early to get as much racing possible. The 32-truck field managed to run 23 laps until it was halted for rain and snow. Not wasting time, NASCAR postponed the race until Sunday evening,Read More

Kimi Räikkönen took his first pole position in nine years with super final lap in Monaco that saw him finish just four hundredths of a second ahead of championship leader Sebastian Vettel as Ferrari locked out the front row. Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas was third but team-mate Lewis Hamilton was eliminated in Q2 in 14th place. Ferrari were quickest out of the blocks in Q1 with Raikkonen on track first, the Finn quickly followed by team-mate Vettel. It was the German who set the early pace and though he was brieflyRead More

By Toby Christie, NASCAR Writer FORT WORTH, TEXAS — When walking around Friday afternoon before qualifying for Sunday’s O’Reilly Auto Parts 500 at Texas Motor Speedway, I couldn’t help but notice there were a ton more fans sitting outside the grandstands checking out the midway than what were actually up in seats watching the racing action. When I asked many of them if they were going to go inside to watch qualifying, they said that they didn’t think qualifying was worth the price of admission. Once qualifying began, I immediatelyRead More

Lewis Hamilton took the first pole position of the new Formula One season, edging Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel and Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas to take his sixth Australian Grand Prix pole by three tenths of a second. Home favourite Daniel Ricciardo crashed out, however, hitting the wall early in the final part of qualifying. The Red Bull driver is set to start tomorrow’s race in P10. Hamilton set the pace in Q1, claiming top spot 10 minutes into the session with a time of 1:24.191. That was good enough to keepRead More

By Toby Christie, NASCAR Editor No this isn’t a recycled article from years past, there will be an all Hendrick Motorsports front row for the 2017 Daytona 500. On a week where all of the talk was about how fast the Ford and Toyota race teams were, it was Chase Elliott and Dale Earnhardt Jr. who stood above the pack when it came to single car qualifying runs for the biggest race of the year. Earnhardt, who is making his return to the sport after missing the second-half of last yearRead More

By Toby Christie, NASCAR Editor FORT WORTH, Texas — It’s been a frustrating season for Team Penske in the Xfinity Series. After an eight-win explosion a year ago, the team has only recorded two victories with just three races remaining in 2016. However, Texas will start with their car on the pole after Brad Keselowski grabbed his first pole of the year in the Xfinity Series in the closest possible margin. In the third and final round of qualifying, Keselowski actually tied Erik Jones for the top spot in the qualifyingRead More

By Toby Christie, NASCAR Editor FORT WORTH, Texas — On an extremely busy day for Austin Dillon, he surprised everyone by capturing the pole for Sunday’s AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway. “I don’t know about the lap. I changed my line a little bit, looking at dart fish. It worked out for me,” said a stunned Dillon after his run. “I thought I hurt myself cause I changed my line, but it actually made me faster through one and two. I was watching Harvick’s line and I changed it to kindRead More

By Toby Christie, NASCAR Editor FORT WORTH, Texas — Over the past couple of seasons, Kyle Busch has been arguably the best driver in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series garage. Friday at Texas Motor Speedway, Busch and his No. 18 team had one of their most trying days in recent memory. In the opening minutes of the first practice session of the weekend, Busch got loose coming off of turn four on his warm up lap and slammed into the outside wall before ever completing a timed lap. The contactRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service RICHMOND, Va. – Don’t tell Denny Hamlin his first pole of the season isn’t significant. In the money round of Friday’s knockout qualifying session, the driver of the No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota toured .75-mile Richmond International Raceway in 22.069 seconds (122.344 mph) to earn the top starting spot for Saturday night’s Federated Auto Parts 400 (7:30 p.m. ET on NBCSN), the final race in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series regular season. “I thought for sure we had too many laps on ourRead More