William Byron won the pole for today’s (July 4) NASCAR Cup Series race at Road America after posting a fast lap speed of 110.359 mph.
It’s the sixth career pole for the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports driver and second on a road course, as his last pole came at the Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL. He’ll start alongside his teammate Kyle Larson on the front row.
“We struggled a little bit off the truck but we had some some good changes in mind, and the Liberty University Chevy was really fast in qualifying,” Byron told NBC Sports after the session. “Was fast in race trim the last run and feel like we just kind of went back to the basics on the road courses. We’ve struggled this year on the road courses and kinda got back to a basic setup and put it all together today. Thanks to Rudy (Fugle, crew chief) and the guys for working really hard. Awesome to see Hendrick one-two on the pole, great horsepower, great speed so hopefully we can keep it up there.”
?@WilliamByron discusses his #BuschPole run and looks forward to the race at @roadamerica at 2:30 PM ET! pic.twitter.com/VVQkhHso0Q
— NASCAR (@NASCAR) July 4, 2021
AJ Allmendinger went 109.844 mph in the second round to claim the third starting position and Tyler Reddick grabbed fourth. Team Penske’s Austin Cindric rounded out the top five after going 109.768 mph.
Denny Hamlin drove his No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing car to sixth and Matt DiBenedetto starts seventh. Ross Chastain, Martin Truex Jr. and Alex Bowman completes the top 10 qualifiers.
Daniel Suarez and Chris Buescher were the final two to make it in the top 12 for the second round.
A couple of stoppages came during round one, first for Kyle Tilley’s stalled car near the beginning of the session. Then in the final few minutes, something broke on Bubba Wallace’s No. 23 and he couldn’t make it all the way around the track, bringing out the red flag once again.
As a result of the last red flag, Chase Elliott couldn’t make a faster lap time and will start in the back.
Cup Qualifying Results
The Jockey Made in America 250 airs at 2:30 p.m. ET on NBC.
About the author
Joy joined Frontstretch in 2019 as a NASCAR DraftKings writer, expanding to news and iRacing coverage in 2020. She's currently an assistant editor and involved with photos, social media and news editing. A California native, Joy was raised watching motorsports and started watching NASCAR extensively in 2001. She earned her B.A. degree in Liberal Studies at California State University Bakersfield in 2010.
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