Practice report
NASCAR Cup Pocono II
Daniel Suarez tops incident-marred Pocono Cup practice
Daniel Suarez was fastest in an eventful practice session at Pocono Raceway that left two drivers going to backup cars.
Jim Utter
Edited: Jul 27, 2019, 2:16 PM
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Suarez’s average lap speed of 172.516 mph led the way in the 55-minute session on Saturday. William Byron was second (172.404 mph) and Aric Almirola ended up third (172.401 mph).
Martin Truex Jr. was fourth and Clint Bowyer completed the top-five, putting three Stewart-Haas Racing drivers in the top-five.
Rounding out the top-10 were Jimmie Johnson, Erik Jones, Denny Hamlin, Kyle Busch (who has won the last two Pocono races) and Matt DiBenedetto.
About 14 minutes into the session, Kyle Larson got loose in Turn 2, hit the wall and heavily damaged his No. 42 Chip Ganassi Racing Chevrolet.
Larson’s team immediately brought out his backup car, which means he will have to start Sunday’s race from the rear of the field. It’s the second consecutive week Larson has wrecked in practice.
“I’m just disappointed in myself,” Larson said. “I got really loose and then over-corrected some and then spun to the inside and hit the wall. I just hate that I did that. We only have today for practice and don’t have much time between practices.
“We probably won’t have much laps in the backup car. I was happy last week with (the team’s) efforts to get that one ready and how good it was in the race as well. Hopefully, we can do it again.
“I just got to stop being stupid.”
About 33 minutes into the session, Chase Elliott got loose in Turn 1 and also hit the wall, leaving his No. 9 Chevrolet heavy right-side damage. Elliott will also move to a backup car and have to start Sunday’s race from the rear of the field.
“I just made a mistake and crashed,” Elliott said. “I put myself in a pretty poor situation there in practice.”
Corey LaJoie also got into the Turn 2 wall during the session but his team was attempting to repair the damage.
Cla # Driver Manufacturer Laps Time Gap Interval Mph 1 41 
Daniel Suarez Ford 17 52.169 172.516 2 24 
William Byron Chevrolet 18 52.203 0.034 0.034 172.404 3 10 Aric Almirola Ford 14 52.204 0.035 0.001 172.401 4 19 Martin Truex Jr. Toyota 23 52.208 0.039 0.004 172.387 5 14 Clint Bowyer Ford 23 52.219 0.050 0.011 172.351 6 48 Jimmie Johnson Chevrolet 13 52.307 0.138 0.088 172.061 7 20 Erik Jones Toyota 24 52.465 0.296 0.158 171.543 8 11 Denny Hamlin Toyota 21 52.629 0.460 0.164 171.008 9 18 Kyle Busch Toyota 16 52.726 0.557 0.097 170.694 10 95 Matt DiBenedetto Toyota 15 52.742 0.573 0.016 170.642 11 12 Ryan Blaney Ford 20 52.745 0.576 0.003 170.632 12 8 Daniel Hemric Chevrolet 22 52.759 0.590 0.014 170.587 13 4 Kevin Harvick Ford 23 52.818 0.649 0.059 170.396 14 9 Chase Elliott Chevrolet 19 52.848 0.679 0.030 170.300 15 21 Paul Menard Ford 20 52.918 0.749 0.070 170.074 16 22 Joey Logano Ford 20 52.931 0.762 0.013 170.033 17 3 Austin Dillon Chevrolet 22 52.974 0.805 0.043 169.895 18 47 Ryan Preece Chevrolet 21 53.047 0.878 0.073 169.661 19 1 Kurt Busch Chevrolet 12 53.052 0.883 0.005 169.645 20 88 Alex Bowman Chevrolet 17 53.065 0.896 0.013 169.603 21 42 Kyle Larson Chevrolet 2 53.186 1.017 0.121 169.217 22 37 Chris Buescher Chevrolet 18 53.293 1.124 0.107 168.878 23 17 Ricky Stenhouse Jr. Ford 14 53.365 1.196 0.072 168.650 24 38 David Ragan Ford 17 53.397 1.228 0.032 168.549 25 6 Ryan Newman Ford 15 53.430 1.261 0.033 168.445 26 13 Ty Dillon Chevrolet 17 53.481 1.312 0.051 168.284 27 34 Michael McDowell Ford 17 53.483 1.314 0.002 168.278 28 2 Brad Keselowski Ford 10 53.512 1.343 0.029 168.187 29 43 Darrell Wallace Jr. Chevrolet 16 53.538 1.369 0.026 168.105 30 36 Matt Tifft Ford 16 53.735 1.566 0.197 167.489 31 32 Corey Lajoie Ford 6 54.419 2.250 0.684 165.383 32 00 Landon Cassill Chevrolet 15 54.849 2.680 0.430 164.087 33 53 Josh Bilicki Chevrolet 12 54.893 2.724 0.044 163.955 34 15 Ross Chastain Chevrolet 13 54.992 2.823 0.099 163.660 35 27 Reed Sorenson Chevrolet 9 55.365 3.196 0.373 162.558 36 51 B.J. McLeod Ford 10 55.504 3.335 0.139 162.150 37 77 Quin Houff Chevrolet 7 55.690 3.521 0.186 161.609 38 52 Austin Theriault Ford 17 56.881 4.712 1.191 158.225
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