Photo Credit: Brian Lawdermilk/Getty Images North America
When the Camping World Truck Series takes the green flag later on tonight, it’ll be John Wes Townley leading the field to the green flag.
Townley captured the pole after laying down a lap of 30.465 seconds (177.253 mph) in the second round of qualifying for the Toyota Tundra 250 at Kansas Speedway. Townley knows what it takes to get the job done, having won on an intermediate track previously. Though notably in four previous starts at Kansas, he has only posted a best finish of 11th.
“Can’t say enough about the Hendrick power – it’s really giving me a big boost today,” Townley said. “We’re off to a great start and hopefully we can start up front, and stay up front all night long.”
Rookie William Byron will start to his outside after missing the pole by 0.141 seconds on Friday afternoon. Byron is looking for a strong run after finishing third in the last truck series event at Martinsville Speedway.
Tyler Reddick will start third as he looks for his first top-10 at Kansas after finishing 13th last year, followed by Cole Custer and Christopher Bell. Bell could use a really strong run after wrecking through the first three races this year.
Atlanta race winner John Hunter Nemechek will start sixth, followed by Matt Tifft, Timothy Peters, Daniel Hemric, Ben Rhodes and Ben Kennedy.
Johnny Sauter made the final round of qualifying, though was unable to make a lap, placing him 12th. He will have to start at the back of the field though for unapproved adjustments as the team makes the required repairs.
“I think when I turned the rear-end fan, one of the hoses fell off in the back,” he commented. “Our Chevrolet was fast so last week I started at the back in a late model and finished second, so we’ll do the same here.”
Defending race winner and defending series champion Matt Crafton will start 13th, followed by Cody Coughlin, Cameron Hayley, Clint Bowyer, Mike Bliss, Parker Kligerman, Tommy Joe Martins and Tyler Young. Ryan Truex qualified 21st – but will have to start to the rear as he made an engine change following the session.
“We’ll get 15 laps into a run and run quicker than a single lap, so we’re scratching our head a little…not a lot, though,” Crafton commented. “We’ll be fine for tonight.”
Sauter and Truex aren’t the only drivers whom experienced issues in qualifying.
Rico Abreu posted one of the slowest laps on the chart after his team left the cowel cover on, and Spencer Gallagher failed to post a lap after scraping the wall on his warm-up lap.
“It’s all on me – I put the right rear where it shouldn’t have been,” Gallagher commented. “The guys have almost got the truck repaired so we’ll be good to go.”
Norm Benning and Mike Harmon would fail to qualify for the race.
