Austin Dillon shoots to the front for the AAA Texas 500
Austin Dillon earned his second pole of the season and third of his career with a blazing lap of 28.081 seconds around Texas Motor Speedway. He’ll lead the field to the green on Sunday in the AAA Texas 500.
“Man, that's huge!" Dillon said. "Great job by everybody on our Bad Boy Realtreee Chevy and everybody at Dow for supporting us and getting us this far. It is our second pole of the year, and I can't be happier for RCR and everybody back at the shop. A lot of hard work and effort goes on. We missed the Chase by just two feet. We want to prove that we can win a race by the end of this year. This is big for us.”
Possibly as important to Dillon was the gun that goes along with the Coors Light Pole Award.
Possibly as important to Dillon was the gun that goes along with the Coors Light Pole Award.
“Oh man, it’s a Henry Repeating Rifle -- it is really cool,” exclaimed Dillon. “For me being an outdoorsman, [I] love shooting, and it’s probably the most special pole award that I could get as a driver. It felt like a win. That was cool. They do a really good job here at Texas of making you feel good when you accomplish something."
Joey Logano’s reaction to his second-place qualifying effort wasn’t nearly as enthusiastic. The driver of the AAA Ford was disappointed in being edged out by 0.06 seconds, giving him his sixth runner-up start of the season.
“That is really frustrating,” Logano said. “Last week we missed it by eight thousandths and this week by six thousandths. Second stings the most. It is crazy to think about how close that is when you are going 200 miles per hour. I don’t know how close that is in feet or probably inches. That is the name of the game though. That is how close the competition is. We are mad about second, and that is when you know your team is in a good spot.”
During his qualifying run, Kevin Harvick said he felt like he got older with each lap.
“Well, it’s hard because it’s really, really fast. You’ve got to be committed to the throttle in order to run a fast lap, and then you’ve got to bounce over all the bumps and be pointed in the right direction over all the bumps in order to make speed,” he explained.
“There are a lot of places to screw up. As I get older, I feel like I screw up more.”
Still, Harvick will roll off third on Sunday afternoon.
Brad Keselowski starts in fourth place and seemed less frustrated than his teammate, Logano.
“Everybody was really close there at the end," Keselowski said. "Three-hundredths for the top-four -- that is a close field. We weren’t where we wanted to be at the start, but we kept on it and kept getting better. That is a testament to Paul Wolfe and the 2 crew here, and I am very proud of that effort.”
Kyle Busch made it into the second round of qualifying, but the No. 18 M & M’s Camry began leaking water, and the team quickly pushed it to the garage.
Crew chief Adam Stevens gave his take on the problem.
“I think it is a byproduct of pounding the fence before we even completed a lap in practice. In our hurry to change the motor and all the drivetrain afterwards, apparently we didn’t get the lower radiator hose completely clamped on the water neck out of the block and proceeded to dump all the water out of it on pit road after our first run. We’re going to start 24th and get after them from there.”
“I think it is a byproduct of pounding the fence before we even completed a lap in practice. In our hurry to change the motor and all the drivetrain afterwards, apparently we didn’t get the lower radiator hose completely clamped on the water neck out of the block and proceeded to dump all the water out of it on pit road after our first run. We’re going to start 24th and get after them from there.”
Chasers Matt Kenseth, Carl Edwards and Kurt Busch start seventh, ninth and 10th, respectively, while Denny Hamlin and Jimmie Johnson roll off 17th and 19th.
The AAA Texas 500 starts at 1:00 p.m. on Sunday, Nov. 6 and will be broadcast on NBC.
The full starting lineup:
The AAA Texas 500 starts at 1:00 p.m. on Sunday, Nov. 6 and will be broadcast on NBC.
The full starting lineup:
Rank
|
Driver
|
Time
|
Speed
| |
1
|
Austin Dillon
|
28.081
|
192.301
| |
2
|
Joey Logano
|
28.087
|
192.26
| |
3
|
Kevin Harvick
|
28.099
|
192.178
| |
4
|
Brad Keselowski
|
28.106
|
192.13
| |
5
|
Kyle Larson
|
28.131
|
191.959
| |
6
|
Paul Menard
|
28.195
|
191.523
| |
7
|
Matt Kenseth
|
28.216
|
191.381
| |
8
|
Ryan Blaney
|
28.232
|
191.272
| |
9
|
Carl Edwards
|
28.274
|
190.988
| |
10
|
Kurt Busch
|
28.34
|
190.543
| |
11
|
Chase Elliott
|
28.357
|
190.429
| |
12
|
Martin Truex, Jr.
|
28.487
|
189.56
| |
13
|
Casey Mears
|
28.238
|
191.232
| |
14
|
A.J. Allmendinger
|
28.244
|
191.191
| |
15
|
Jamie McMurray
|
28.265
|
191.049
| |
16
|
Alex Bowman
|
28.288
|
190.894
| |
17
|
Denny Hamlin
|
28.298
|
190.826
| |
18
|
Ryan Newman
|
28.335
|
190.577
| |
19
|
Jimmie Johnson
|
28.493
|
189.52
| |
20
|
Ricky Stenhouse, Jr.
|
28.542
|
189.195
| |
21
|
Aric Almirola
|
28.623
|
188.659
| |
22
|
Danica Patrick
|
28.742
|
187.878
| |
23
|
Tony Stewart
|
281.286
|
19.198
| |
24
|
Kyle Busch
|
0
| ||
25
|
Greg Biffle
|
28.251
|
191.144
| |
26
|
Trevor Bayne
|
28.308
|
190.759
| |
27
|
Clint Bowyer
|
28.312
|
190.732
| |
28
|
Michael McDowell
|
28.343
|
190.523
| |
29
|
Brian Scott
|
28.372
|
190.328
| |
30
|
Chris Buescher
|
28.374
|
190.315
| |
31
|
Kasey Kahne
|
28.389
|
190.215
| |
32
|
Regan Smith
|
28.435
|
189.907
| |
33
|
Matt DiBenedetto
|
28.436
|
189.9
| |
34
|
Landon Cassill
|
28.561
|
189.069
| |
35
|
Ryan Ellis
|
28.648
|
188.495
| |
36
|
David Ragan
|
28.778
|
187.643
| |
37
|
Michael Annett
|
28.903
|
186.832
| |
38
|
Reed Sorenson
|
29.316
|
184.2
| |
39
|
Joey Gase
|
29.66
|
182.063
| |
40
|
Josh Wise
|
29.877
|
180.741
|
Austin Dillon shoots to the front for the AAA Texas 500
Reviewed by Janine Cloud
on
Friday, November 04, 2016
Rating:
