DENNY-LAND: Denny Hamlin won the pole Friday for the Sprint Cup race tonight at Richmond. “How many times is he supposed to hit you before you say, ‘I’ve had enough of it?'” Stewart said. “We were really competitive in the first race, and I think we’ll bring back a similar setup, but a better vehicle, and work from there in practice”. “We made a little adjustment but the vehicle just got tight and felt like the track slowed down more than I expected”. I am really proud of the effort this team made and proud of the changes made during each run. A lot of guys that we were challenging only had one lap per session. Here are some picks we have for this race.
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Truex was steady in Friday’s knockout qualifying, advancing to the 12-driver pole-shootout round by posting the ninth and second fastest speeds respectively in the first two rounds. Buescher and Elliott become the first rookies to make the Chase since Hamlin qualified in 2006.
It also marks the 24th consecutive race Hamlin will start from inside the top 10.
Kevin Harvick, No. 4 Chevrolet, 2,006: He has the most top-10 finishes (21) and the most runs in the top five (13) and has led the points most of the season. We didn’t qualify very well. “We were a little better than we were last time here, so there is a little bit of positive to it, believe it or not”. We’re trying to stay out of trouble and be there at the end.
Jamie McMurray (122.189 mph) took control of another important head-to-head matchup, making the final round of qualifying and earning the fourth starting spot.
Chase Elliott, Austin Dillon and Jami McMurrary are in the catbird seat tonight, as long as they dont find disaster in Richmond.
Newman, who finished eighth last week at Darlington but was penalized 15 points after failing post-race inspection, enjoys racing at Richmond, where he owns an 11.7 career average finish.
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“We know what we have to do and that is win”, said Bayne.”If we win, we are in the Chase. It’s a big boost of confidence and that’s what we all do it for”. “We did previous year in this race coming up, we did have a tire failure and we blew a tire, but Chicago has been good for us, decent place to run top 10 for sure, and then Dover, of course, is a really good place for us”. Clint Bowyer is very good at the Virginia track. “As an organization, it’s been really good, and the next 10 races, if we can get in, it’s going to be pretty awesome, because our cars have peaked at the right time”. “That’s the plan. We’ve got to do and try and progress through the Chase and see what we can pull off”. Chris Buescher also had a regular-season race win but headed into Richmond too close to the top-30 cut-off to already have a Chase berth clinched. “I’ve done this before at home (in 2009 and ’10) and every one, is like, better than the next, especially going into the Chase”.
