He had to finish in the top two to make it into the Sprint All-Star Race and Clint Bowyer did just that as he dominated the second half of the 40 lap Sprint Showdown to grab the victory.

“Our car was really strong,” Bowyer said on Fox. “We’ve been struggling. We’ve been fast in practice but can’t close the race.

“I spent a lot of time in the shop this week and I think we got to the bottom of a lot of things. … Huge improvement tonight.”

He will be joined in transferring by A.J. Allmendinger, who  led the middle portion of the race after qualifying second. It marks Allmendinger’s first All-Star race as he continues to show more improvement each weekend.

The rest of the drivers will not transfer to the main event tomorrow night with Casey Mears leading the way with a third place finish, followed by Marcos Ambrose and Aric Almirola. Ambrose had to fight back after going for a spin at lap three due to contact with Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

Kyle Larson finished sixth, followed by Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Austin Dillon, Paul Menard and Danica Patrick.

Beyond the top two finishers, a driver chosen by the fans advances to the all-star race on Saturday night. The Reddit/Dodgecoin nation struck gold as they voted Josh Wise into the show. Wise finished 18th in the Showdown.

“I am still trying to wrap my head around it,” Wise said. “This is huge for me and our team. Really this started with a 16-year-old kid posting something on Reddit.com about some good runs that we had and for whatever reason this huge, awesome community got behind us.”

Well some people aren’t pleased that a backrunner is in the show, it could help popularity with the sport in attracting new fans.

“This is kind of a big deal for our sport because it is a lot of young kids and people from around the world,” Wise said. “I’ve had the chance to interact with a lot of them. There’s a lot of people had never watched a NASCAR race who have now watched several.”

On Friday afternoon, it’d be Austin Dillon laying down a lap of 27.747 seconds at Charlotte Motor Speedway to win the pole for the 29th Annual Sprint Showdown.

The race is set up for drivers who have not locked themselves into the Sprint All-Star Race to run. The top two finishers in the 40 lap race tonight will get to run the All-Star race tomorrow.

Dillon, a rookie this year, went out mid-way through the single-car qualifying session and laid down the quickest lap despite being mid-pack in practice.

“These guys did a great job,” the driver of the No. 3 Dow Chevrolet said. “The car was hard to drive during practice and we changed a lot as best as we could and used our teammates to try and get better. I came to the green pretty hard and we were a little free off of two – but it paid off. Hopefully we can do well tonight and get into the all-star race. We’re going to give it all we got. It was a huge improvement from practice. It’s like a win for us.”

AJ Allmendinger qualified second in his No. 47 Freightliner/Miller Welders Chevrolet, eight-hundreths off of Dillon’s time. For Richard Childress Racing, it gives them a sweep of the front row. Allmendinger is running for JTG Daughtry Racing, but JTG entered a technical alliance with RCR this year.

“To go out that early and put a lap down like that, it’s good,” he said. “We’re just digging away. We have a fast Chevy. I was just hoping to be in the top five and to be on the front row, it’s great. We’re going to head out there and run hard in the 40 lap showdown.”

Kyle Larson qualified third, followed by Clint Bowyer and Marcos Ambrose.

Paul Menard qualified sixth, followed by Danica Patrick, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Casey Mears and Aric Almirola.