LOUDON, N.H. (July 14, 2017) – After initially qualifying second for Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, Martin Truex Jr. was later informed that he won the pole due to Kyle Larson’s car failing post-qualifying inspection.
It was the first pole of the season for Truex, who had qualified second five times. It was also his 13th career pole.
“Not the way we wanted to get our first pole of the year,” said Truex. “But looking forward to starting front and having a good pit selection.”
Truex’s teammate Erik Jones qualified sixth in his No. 77 5-hour ENERGY Toyota.
Truex, driving the No 78 WIX Filters Toyota Camry, got progressively better during the three rounds of qualifying. He was 20th fastest after the first round and fourth after the second. In the pole-shootout round his lap time/speed on the 1-mile flat track was 28.621 seconds at 133.077 mph on 1-mile flat track.
“I am excited about the weekend with WIX Filter as the primary on the 78,” said Truex. “Hopefully we’ll get them a good run on Sunday and see if we can go get some more points.”
Jones will line up the No. 77 5-hour ENERGY Extra Strength Toyota Camry on the outside of Row 3. His best lap in the pole round was 28.854 at 132.002. He was second in the first round and third in the second.
“I think we probably had a little bit better car than that but just got too free in on the last session,” said Jones. “Seventh is a good starting spot. We can win from there, so we’ve just got to work on it a little bit more in race trim tomorrow. If the track’s going to change a lot, we’ll have to get the 5-hour ENERGY Camry a little bit better and go race for a win.”(D.H.FRR/pr 7.24.17)
Starting Line Up
New Hampshire Motor Speedway
25th Annual Overton’s 301
1 – Martin Truex Jr
2 – Jimmie Johnson
3 – Matt Kenseth
4 – Jamie McMurray
5 – Kasey Kahne
6 – Erik Jones
7 – Kyle Busch
8 – Denny Hamlin
9 – Kurt Busch
10 – Brad Keselowski
11 – Chase Elliott
12 – Kevin Harvick
13 – Joey Logano
14 – Daniel Suarez
15 – Ryan Blaney
16 – Matt DiBenedetto
17 – Ricky Stenhouse Jr
18 – Dale Earnhardt Jr
19 – Clint Bowyer
20 – Michael McDowell
21 – Aric Almirola
22 – Chris Buescher
23 – AJ Allmendinger
24 – Ryan Newman
25 – Ty Dillon
26 – Austin Dillon
27 – Trevor Bayne
28 – Landon Cassill
29 – Paul Menard
30 – Danica Patrick
31 – Corey Lajoie
32 – David Ragan
33 – Cole Whitt
34 – Gray Gaulding
35 – Reed Sorenson
36 – Ryan Sieg
37 – Jeffrey Earnhardt
38 – Josh Bilicki
39 – Kyle Larson
