Although Joey Logano was fastest in the first round, Christopher Bell starts on pole for the NASCAR Xfinity Series Roseanne 300 at Auto Club Speedway. This is Bell’s third pole in the last four races.
“Qualifying’s about speed, and this No. 20 team has had speed,” Bell said. “When we unloaded yesterday, we were really good. I was just little bit loose, and anytime we’d tighten it up and make it more comfortable for me to drive, we’d slow down. We learned something there, and I’m going to have to man up and drive this thing in the race.”
Bell (181.059 mph) was the only driver in the 181 mph bracket. Joey Logano (180.923 mph) will start second, as the two drivers were the only ones to break into a 39 second lap time. John Hunter Nemechek, Cole Custer and Daniel Hemric round out the top five positions. Christopher Bell was fastest in first practice, but was only able to clock a 40.299 second lap time, roughly half a second slower than his qualifying time.
Qualifying was split into two rounds. During the first round, all 40 teams made an attempt but Dylan Lupton spun and crashed into the wall right after he took the green flag for his lap. While drivers have been splitting the seam in the corners to gain maximum grip, Lupton couldn’t get into the right position entering the corner, which resulted in the car stepping out from underneath him. He spun in Turn 1 and crashed in Turn 2, settling into the infield grass. The team had to pull out a backup car and will only have three hours to prepare the backup car.
Cole Custer held the top spot in the first round, but was also the last car to qualify with cloud cover. The remainder of the first round and all of the second round of qualifying had clear skies with sun all around the track.
Justin Allgaier, Ryan Reed, Ryan Preece, Brandon Jones, Ryan Truex, Elliott Sadler and Kaz Grala finished out the qualifying results for positions 6-12 from the second round. All three manufacturers are represented across the top three starting positions (only one Dodge qualified, Timmy Hill, and will start in the 35th position). NASCAR’s top three touring series are also represented with the top three starters: Christopher Bell on pole running the NASCAR Xfinity Series primarily, Joey Logano starting second from the NASCAR Monster Energy Cup Series, and John Hunter Nemechek who runs primarily in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series will start in the third position.
The green flag for the Roseanne 300 will wave later today at 2:18 p.m. local time.
