Tony Stewart claimed his first pole in four and a half years by winning Friday’s qualifying for the Samsung Mobile 500 at Texas Motor Speedway.
Stewart, who is expected to make his 400th career Sprint Cup Series start at Texas, turned a lap of 191.327 m.p.h. around the fast 1.5-mile oval for his 11th career pole. His last pole came 155 races ago in October 2005 at Martinsville.
“I forgot what it was like to win a pole,” Stewart jokingly said.
Stewart grabbed his third pole position at Texas, but his first in a stock car here. He won the pole for the first two IndyCar Series races held at Texas from 1997-98. MiamiHerald.com
Former IRL star Sam Hornish Jr., still winless in his third full Sprint Cup season, almost knocked Stewart off the pole. He settled for second with a lap of 191.232.
Greg Biffle, who was denied a seventh straight top-10 finish to start the season last week in Phoenix, qualified third for Sunday’s race. Four-time defending Sprint Cup champion and current points leader Jimmie Johnson was fourth, followed by Kasey Kahne.
Stewart’s strong qualifying run came a week after Ryan Newman won for the first time with Stewart-Haas Racing and ended his 77-race drought. The Canadian Press
“I’m surprised,” confessed Stewart, who will make his 400th start in the Cup Series on Sunday. “I’m not really much of a qualifier, but it shows what [crew chief] Darian Grubb and all the guys at Stewart-Haas ... how hard the work they’ve been doing, and [this is] the result.”
Stewart was the 23rd driver to make a qualifying attempt, but he didn’t think the relatively late draw gave him a significant advantage.
“It seems like the track cools down a lot during the session, and everybody worries about where you draw for your run,” Stewart said. “We picked up time from practice, which was good, obviously, but it didn’t seem like the conditions changed a lot [Friday], which was unusual.”
“I’ve basically put it out of my mind,” Hornish said. “It was a tough deal. Obviously, we didn’t want to be involved in anything, but you go back and you look at the tape—we got hit from behind, and I don’t know what else I could have done to have that deal turn out any differently.”
Jeff Burton, Kyle Busch, Clint Bowyer, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Ryan Newman will start from positions six through 10, respectively. NASCAR.com
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NASCAR Sprint Cup Series: Samsung Mobile 500 at Texas - Race Line-Up
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