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Stat Sheet: Front Row … Michael?

With just one car left to run in qualifying for February’s Daytona 500, Michael McDowell looked poised to score the first pole of his NASCAR Cup Series career for the biggest race on the calendar.

McDowell, a two-time Cup winner and 2021 Daytona 500 champion, had won zero poles in 465 Cup starts. His team, Front Row Motorsports, only had one pole in its entire existence, won by David Gilliland at Daytona International Speedway in July 2014. Even if was just a qualifying session, a pole would’ve been a monumental achievement for both McDowell and FRM.

But as fate would have it, that last car was Joey Logano, who outran McDowell’s time and snagged the Daytona 500 pole at the last possible moment. McDowell’s quest to win a pole would have to wait.

A week was all it took, as he won on the pole for the next race at Atlanta Motor Speedway for the first of his career and the first for FRM in nearly a decade.

Two months later, McDowell won his second pole at Talladega Superspeedway. Two months later, he won another. And another. And another.

And another.

McDowell’s pole for Sunday’s (Oct. 6) YellaWood 500 at Talladega marked his unprecedented sixth pole of the season, leading all drivers. After starting his career 0-for-466 in qualifying, McDowell has now earned six poles in his last 30 starts.

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One of his poles came at World Wide Technology Raceway in June, while his other five were won at superspeedways: two at Talladega, two at Atlanta and one at Daytona in August.

That qualifying success carried over to McDowell’s teammate Todd Gilliland, who qualified top four at five of the six drafting tracks this season. At Daytona in August, Gilliland qualified second behind McDowell for Front Row’s first-ever sweep of the front row in qualifying.

When combined with his front-row start in the Daytona 500, McDowell ended 2024 with a mind-boggling average start of 1.2 on drafting tracks. It’s the first time a driver has won five straight poles on superspeedways since the mid-80s. It’s the first time a driver has accomplished it since NASCAR started restricting speeds at Daytona and Talladega in 1988.

With all the single-car speed that McDowell and the No. 34 team had, you’d think it would translate to better finishes, right?

Well, not quite.

Despite winning five poles and leading 167 laps between Daytona, Talladega and Atlanta this season, McDowell had an average finish of 27.3 at those tracks — the worst average finish of all 36 teams.

An eighth-place finish at Atlanta in February was McDowell’s lone top 20 on drafting tracks this season. He otherwise had three crash DNFs (two at Talladega, one at Daytona) and a mechanical failure in the Daytona 500 that knocked him 24 laps off the pace.

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An all-time historic run of qualifying on superspeedways ended with bottom-of-the-barrel results at the checkered flag. Sports can be so rewarding, yet so cruel at the same time.

McDowell’s 2024 will ultimately go down as one of the most unusual seasons in recent memory. If he is unable to win one of the last five races, he will tie the modern-era record for most poles won in a winless season.

Furthermore, there have been eight seasons in the modern era where a driver won at least six poles, led less than 500 laps and/or failed to win a race.

Ken Schrader’s 1993 is the only season in the modern era where a driver accomplished all three feats. McDowell’s 2024 season is currently on the pace to be the second.

Make no mistake, the No. 34 team’s qualifying dominance on superspeedways this season is nothing to scoff at. We haven’t seen one team and one driver be that dominant in single-car speed at superspeedways in decades, if not ever.

But at the same time, it’s all about where you finish, not where you start. McDowell and FRM would trade all six of those poles for a race win with no questions asked.

About the author

Stephen Stumpf is the NASCAR Content Director for Frontstretch and is a three-year veteran of the site. His weekly columns include “Stat Sheet” and “4 Burning Questions.” He also writes commentary, contributes to podcasts, edits articles and is frequently at the track for on-site coverage.

Can find on Twitter @stephen_stumpf.

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Pat S

He had speed during the races and was wrecked out of the lead a few times and led a race high 42 laps this past weekend.

What’s more impressive to me is that during those single car qualifying runs his car continued to accelerate through the qualifying laps while most of the other cars just seemed to level off in speed at a point on their laps.

DoninAjax

They only have to get to ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTEEN (in 576 real races) to catch David Pearson.