For the ninth straight year in the Monster Energy Cup Series, Joey Logano has won a pole.
The streak continued with the Penske driver’s 21st career pole and his fifth at Martinsville Speedway.
“It’s awesome get another pole at Martinsville,” Logano said. “Hopefully we can top it off with another win with the Shell Pennzoil Mustang. This is always a fun race and I always look forward to coming up here.”
RT to congratulate @JoeyLogano on winning the #BuschPole!#STP500 | @MartinsvilleSwy pic.twitter.com/D1ySbzVQBK
— NASCAR (@NASCAR) March 23, 2019
Aric Almirola, Brad Keselowski, Kevin Harvick and Denny Hamlin rounded out the top five.
Stage 1 was fairly calm with Hamlin, the Chesterfield Virginia native, setting the pace with two stages to go. The notables not advancing to Stage 2 included both cars from Richard Childress Racing in Daniel Hemric and Austin Dillon as well as Ricky Stenhouse Jr. from Roush Fenway Racing.
"We'll go get 'em tomorrow."@StenhouseJr will not advance to Round 2 after qualifying 25th. pic.twitter.com/4o9MR29UCM
— NASCAR (@NASCAR) March 23, 2019
In Stage two, the surprise of the weekend occurred when the winner of the Truck Series race earlier today and the winner of the past two races in the Monster Energy Cup Series, Kyle Busch, did not make it out of Round 3. He was 14th after his first run and tried to go out and make it into the third round but it was not enough so he will try to go for three in a row from the 14th starting position.
Ryan Blaney did not make it out of Round 2 as well as Kurt Busch, Erik Jones and Paul Menard.
After cutting a tire in the first practice, William Byron rebounded to qualify sixth, followed by Kyle Larson, Chase Elliott, Martin Truex Jr.
The STP 500 will televised on FS1 with the telecast starting at 2 p.m. ET.
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