Leaving little doubt who had the fastest car, Brad Keselowski laid down the top speed in all three rounds of qualifying and blazed to the No. 1 starting position in qualifying Friday at Texas Motor Speedway.
NASCAR Texas 2015 qualifying results: Brad Keselowski rolls to pole
Brad Keselowski took his third pole of the season in qualifying for Sunday’s race. Defending series champion Kevin Harvick starts second.
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Keselowski’s lap of 196.929 mph topped defending Sprint Cup champion Kevin Harvick (195.993 mph) and Kyle Busch (195.716 mph) to capture the pole for Sunday’s AAA Texas 500. Joey Logano, a teammate of Keselowski’s at Team Penske, and Kyle Larson completed the top five qualifiers.
“Our ultimate goal is to be the fastest at the end of the race on Sunday and this is a good start,” Keselowski said. “I am pumped about this race.”
The pole was Keselowski’s 11th of his career and third of the season.
Penske’s two drivers combined to lead 350 of 500 laps last weekend at Martinsville Speedway, but neither Keselowski nor Logano finished well. Keselowski got caught in a multi-car incident involving Matt Kenseth and Kurt Busch and finished 32nd, while Logano was later deliberately wrecked by Kenseth and finished 37th.
Because of their respective Martinsville issues, Keselowski and Logano are each in a virtual must-win situation where they need either a victory Sunday or next week at Phoenix International Speedway to avoid being eliminated from the Chase for the Sprint Cup playoff.
“We know we will probably need to win two of the next three to win the championship,” Keselowski said. “We have that opportunity and there is no reason to focus on what we don’t have, which is the ability to finish consistent and make it to the next round. I would rather spend time focusing on what we do have, the opportunity to win two of the next three and win a championship.”
In addition to the Penske teammates, as well as Busch and Harvick, other Chase drivers qualified in this order: Kurt Busch (seventh), Carl Edwards (13th), Jeff Gordon (18th) and Martin Truex Jr. (23rd). Only Gordon has clinched a spot in the championship finale due to winning at Martinsville.
Joey Gase and Reed Sorenson failed to qualify.
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