NSCS: Kurt Busch Sets Track Record En Route to Vegas Pole

Hometown hero Kurt Busch rocketed to the pole during Friday’s pole qualifying at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in preparation for Sunday’s Kobalt Tools 400.

Busch put his No.41 Monster Energy Chevrolet on rails in the final round of qualifying to the tune of 27.505 Seconds at 196.328 MPH which broke the previous track record set by Jeff Gordon in last March’s event at LVMS.

Busch who missed this race last year while serving a three race suspension is ready to claim his first victory on the 1.5 mile oval.

“It was insanely fast,” Busch explained. “It’s amazing all the detail that goes into qualifying with finding that perfect lap three times out there. My second outing we were way tight and I didn’t know where it came from”.

“(Tony) Gibson, (crew chief) and crew went to town. They just adjusted on it. We gambled and we made that last session, which was great. That was icing on the cake to be able to go out into the third round. I was first or 12th it didn’t matter.

Busch says maintaining good track position will be key in winning Sunday’s race.

“It’s going to be neat to have that pit stall at the end and just kind of roll off the jack and hopefully beat everybody off pit road if they have done a better job through the race to get ahead of us,” Busch said. “We hope to protect our track position all day.”

Joey Logano will start his No.22 Pennzoil Ford on the front row for Sunday’s race.  Logano is also looking for his first win at Vegas.

“Second is so close,” Logano said. “Second always stings the most. I felt like that last run I just – I told Todd that our car was close I just had to want it more. I pushed as hard as I could and got a little tight in one and two and that was enough to give up that speed we needed to get the pole tonight. I am so proud of what this Pennzoil team has done to pick up over last week. Dang it. It is so close. It was a lot of fun out there tonight and we are looking forward to Sunday.”

Matt Kenseth, Brad Keselowski, and Austin Dillon rounded out the top five followed by defending race winner Kevin Harvick, Aric Almirola, Kasey Kahne, Denny Hamlin, and Martin Truex Jr. rounding out the top 10.

One of Sunday’s favorites Carl Edwards will have to start from the rear in a backup car after crashing his No.19 Toyota in the second round of qualifying.

“It hit hard, bounced up the race track and man, that was it,” Edwards said after emerging unhurt.

Fourteen cars broke the track record during Friday’s qualifying session.