Martin Truex Jr. stormed to the Coors Light Pole Award in Friday's qualifying for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series at Pocono Raceway.
Truex logged a fast lap of 179.244 mph in the Furniture Row Racing No. 78 Toyota on the 2.5-mile triangular track. He'll start first in Sunday's Pennsylvania 400 (1:30 p.m. ET, NBCSN, MRN, SiriusXM), the 21st of 36 points-paying races for the circuit this year.
The Coors Light Pole Award is Truex's third of the season, his first at Pocono and the 10th of his Sprint Cup career.
Carl Edwards' Joe Gibbs Racing No. 19 Toyota will start alongside Truex in Sunday's 400-miler after posting the second-fastest qualifying lap (178.873 mph) in the final five-minute session. Paul Menard, Denny Hamlin and Ryan Newman completed the top five.
Jeff Gordon, a six-time Pocono winner making his second Sprint Cup start of the season in place of Dale Earnhardt Jr., was 24th-fastest in the Hendrick Motorsports No. 88 Chevrolet. Earnhardt is missing his third consecutive race weekend, out indefinitely as he recovers from concussion-like symptoms.
NASCAR competition officials delayed the start of qualifying by 20 minutes to allow teams extra time to make their way through the Laser Inspection Station (LIS). Scott Miller, NASCAR senior vice president of competition, said that a glitch early Friday forced the wait time in the inspection process.
"I'm not exactly sure of the exact technical thing that happened (with the LIS), but it got back online really quick," Miller said. "One thing I want to make clear is, the reason we're moving this back is because we had a little bit of ownership in it with our equipment. On a regular weekend, if everything … if we had our time block and our equipment worked fine and this was a team issue getting through templates and they didn't get out there, we would be inclined not to extend qualifying and if they miss qualifying it's on them."
Despite the delay, all teams made it through inspection in time for the first 20-minute round of qualifying. The last of those was the Joe Gibbs Racing No. 18 Toyota team for driver Kyle Busch, who cut it close but made his first qualifying pass with roughly five minutes left in the opening session. No. 18 crew chief Adam Stevens told NBCSN that the car was initially out of tolerance with the rear-axle toe.
Busch will start 16th after missing out on the 12-driver cut after qualifying's Round 2. His brother Kurt, who won the Sprint Cup tour's most recent race at Pocono, was 15th-fastest and will start alongside him in the eighth row.
Greg Biffle just missed the 24-driver cutoff in the opening round of qualifying, with a late run by rookie Chris Buescher knocking him to 25th-fastest.
Sprint Cup teams have an 80-minute final practice scheduled Saturday at 11 a.m. ET (NBCSN) ahead of Sunday's Pennsylvania 400 (1:30 p.m. ET, NBCSN, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
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