Kyle Busch Continues Dominance; Burton Crashes Again

[media-credit name=”Photo Credit: Noel Lanier” align=”alignright” width=”225″][/media-credit]Kyle Busch was blistering quick last evening as he set the track record in winning the pole and his dominance of the weekend continued as he led practice this morning with a blistering lap of 26.55. Busch ran 35 laps during the session. Denny Hamlin was second quickest to make it a clean sweep for JGR Racing. Hamlin ran 14 laps and set a lap of 26.67. Both are favorites to win the race this weekend.

Martin Truex Jr., Brad Keselowski, and Joey Logano rounded out the top-5. Truex is starting on the outside of the front row for the race tomorrow. Keselowski struggled during his qualifying lap primarily due to the cloud coverage in the area, but ran 24 laps and was very happy with his run. Joey Logano has had decent cars here in the past, but has never really been there at the end of the race to show it. He starts tomorrow in 15th, behind Keselowski.

Paul Menard, Aric Almirola, Clint Bowyer, Kasey Kahne, and Jeff Gordon rounded out the top-10. Bowyer is the last driver other than the top two that still has a mathematical chance to win the Chase. He sits 36 points back. For those who follow the old system, Johnson leads Keselowski by 19 points, and Greg Biffle by 46.

Speaking of Jimmie Johnson, he has not had a good weekend so far. He struggled in practice this morning, only running as high as 24th on the sheets with a fastest lap of 26.91. He is a 4-time winner here in Phoenix and it just seems like he hasn’t completely gotten used to the new surface despite finishing in the top-5 here in the spring.

[media-credit name=”Photo Credit: Noel Lanier” align=”alignright” width=”234″][/media-credit]Jeff Burton has also had a weekend to forget. He wrecked his primary car on Friday, and had brake issues on his No.31 in practice today. Burton’s team opted to change chassis on the No.31 and will use their backup for the Cup event tomorrow. At the time of the accident, Burton was 20th quickest on the track.