Truex takes Pocono pole over Edwards

Truex posted a lap of 179.244mph to earn the pole for Sunday’s Pennsylvania 400 — his 10th career pole in the Sprint Cup Series and third this season.

“The cars have been fast lately,” Truex said. “They’ve been fun to drive. We just haven’t been getting the greatest results. Hopefully, we’ll start to change. This car really felt good to me.”

Carl Edwards’ Toyota was second fast with a speed of 178.873mph.

“Everybody great job,” Edwards told the crew. “That was good work.”

After Paul Menard ran a lap of 178.671mph — which was initially the provisional pole — his new crew chief said, “Either way, hell of a job. Great job the first time out.”

Menard was the top Chevy in time trials and will start third. Denny Hamlin (178.540mph), Ryan Newman (178.433mph) and Tony Stewart (178.394mph) will complete the first three rows.

Brad Keselowski was the top Ford with a lap of 178.359mph. Chase Elliott (177.571mph), Matt Kenseth (177.413mph), Joey Logano 177.151mph, Kyle Larson (177.082mph) and Austin Dillon (176.835mph) rounded out the top 12.

Larson's team received their fourth written warning in pre-qualifying inspection and will lose pit stall selection for Sunday's race. Matt DiBenedetto's team received their fourth warning last Sunday and also lost pit stall selection.

Truex, who won the June race last year, said he’s “very optimistic” about Sunday.

“We had a really good car the first go around here in June and we got tore up on pit road on the first pit stop so we really didn’t get to see what we had,” Truex said. “That was a little frustrating. But all in all, today is going really well. I had good speed right off the trailer. We just need tweaking on it and getting better. We got the speed, now hopefully we’ll get to practice tomorrow to get it dialed in for Sunday.”

Round 3 Results

Round 2

Four Toyotas topped Round 2. Martin Truex Jr. led the round with a speed of 178.426mph. Carl Edwards (178.363mph), Denny Hamlin (178.105mph) and Matt Kenseth (178,094mph) were the top Camrys followed by the Chevys of Paul Menard (178.094mph), Chase Elliott (177.806mph) Ryan Newman (177.799mph), Tony Stewart (177.620mph), Kyle Larson (177.543mph) and Austin Dillon (177.483mph).

Both Newman and Dillon needed second attempts to move up the speed chart.

The Team Penske Fords of Brad Keselowski (177.473mph) and Joey Logano (177.466mph) were the last two cars to transfer to the final round.

A.J. Allmendinger was the first driver to miss the top 12 after sitting on a lap of 177.322mph.

Kurt Busch, who won the June race, was baffled by the difference in his car.

"Still tight coming to the green," said Busch, who will roll off 15th on Sunday. "We can't be as good as we were in the spring and as tight as we are now with the same car.”

Kyle Busch’s best lap was good enough for 16th. Jeff Gordon starts 24th on Sunday.

Round 2 Results

Round 1

Carl Edwards posted the fast lap in the first round — 177.880mph.

Martin Truex Jr. was second with a speed of 177.417mph followed by the Ford of Ryan Blaney (177.291mph), Kevin Harvick in a Chevy (177.172mph) and Kyle Busch.

NASCAR elected to delay qualifying for 20 minutes with six cars needing to return through inspection.

Executive vice president of competition Scott Miller acknowledged the sanctioning body is getting a bit frustrated with the teams’ antics.

“Absolutely,” Miller said. “I'd love for all the cars to be out there and ready to go, no doubt about that. Today, we have a little bit of ownership in this one. We got off to a little bit of a slow start with the LIS. We had a little software glitch to start off, got it rectified quickly, which probably put us about 10 minutes behind. We thought we would be able to make it up at some of the other stations. Teams are pushing the issue like they always do and we weren't able to make the time up.

"Since we had a little ownership in this one, we decided to push the start time back a little bit. One thing I want to make clear is the reason we moved this back is because we had little bit of ownership in it with our equipment. On a regular weekend, if we had our time block and our equipment worked fine and this was a team issue, we would be inclined not to extend (the start of) qualifying and if they missed qualifying, it would be on them."

With 15 minutes remaining in the first round, Matt Kenseth was able to clear inspection and hit the track. He posted a lap of 175.565 mph — which was initially in the top 24. Kenseth had to make a second attempt to move on to the second round. His lap of 176.315mph was solid enough for 14th.

“We had to run that Matt,” the 20 crew told their driver. We would have been bumped by one spot.

At the nine-minute mark, Kyle Busch finally climbed into his car. The No. 18 car had issues with the rear-axle toe on the LIS (Laser Inspection Station).

The crew told the driver, “Anything in the teens or the 51.50 (second) mark will be just fine.”

Busch rolled out on the track with just over six minutes remaining. His first lap was 177.106mph (50.817-seconds). “P5,” the No. 18 crew told their driver.

Joey Logano (176.869mph), Ryan Newman (176.682mph), Jimmie Johnson (176.578mph), Denny Hamlin (176.512mph), Paul Menard (176,543mph), Brad Keselowski (176.512mph) and Austin Dillon (176.391mph) rounded out the top 12.

Also transferring were Chase Elliott, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Kurt Busch, Kasey Kahne, Chris Buescher, Kyle Larson, Casey Mears, Tony Stewart, Jamie McMurray, Jeff Gordon and AJ Allmendinger.

Greg Biffle, who posted the 25th quick time, admitted he was a bit conservative with his lap.

“We have a fast race car, so we’ll be ok on Sunday,” says Biffle, who won at Pocono in 2010.

Round 1 Results

Starting Lineup

Cla	#	Driver	Manufacturer	Time	Gap	Mph
1	78	Martin Truex Jr.	Toyota	50.211	--	179.244
2	19	Carl Edwards	Toyota	50.315	0.104	178.873
3	27	Paul Menard	Chevrolet	50.372	0.161	178.671
4	11	Denny Hamlin	Toyota	50.409	0.198	178.540
5	31	Ryan Newman	Chevrolet	50.439	0.228	178.433
6	14	Tony Stewart	Chevrolet	50.450	0.239	178.394
7	2	Brad Keselowski	Ford	50.460	0.249	178.359
8	24	Chase Elliott	Chevrolet	50.684	0.473	177.571
9	20	Matt Kenseth	Toyota	50.729	0.518	177.413
10	22	Joey Logano	Ford	50.804	0.593	177.151