HOMESTEAD, Fla. – Hendrick Motorsports driver Alex Bowman provided a dramatic final few minutes of Busch Light Pole Qualifying Saturday afternoon, claiming the pole position for Sunday’s Straight Talk Wireless 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway (3 p.m. ET on FS1, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
With only four cars remaining in the session, Bowman’s No. 48 Chevrolet set a fast lap of 168.845 mph around the 1.5-mile track, knocking Front Row Motorsports’ Noah Gragson from the lead position he held for most of the qualifying session.
RELATED: Starting lineup | At-track photos: Homestead
Josh Berry, last week’s Las Vegas Motor Speedway race winner for the Wood Brothers Racing team, took the track immediately after and nearly equaled Bowman’s lap. Instead, his No. 21 Ford was timed a mere 0.073 seconds off the pole-winning pace, earning a front-row spot alongside the Hendrick Motorsports driver.
This is Bowman’s sixth career pole position and first at Homestead, a place the 32-year-old Arizona native doesn’t necessarily consider one of his historically better tracks. He has only a pair of top-10 finishes, but his best outcome — seventh place — came in the series’ most recent Homestead visit last October.
“There were some cars not so great on the short run and really fast on the long run, and we were kind of the opposite of that practice. We were really faster in the short run and not great on the long-run stuff, so I knew qualifying was going to be really important because of that and that we had some work to do for tomorrow,” Bowman said, “But for me, I had a pretty clear-cut plan for qualifying, and I thought I was able to execute that pretty well and my race car gave me what I needed to do that.”
Gragson will start third, followed by Daytona 500 polesitter Chase Briscoe in the No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota and current NASCAR Cup Series championship leader William Byron in the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet.
“We’re still really fast, but I’ve never gotten a pole in the Cup Series, but our Beef-a-Roo Mustang is pretty quick on the short run,” said Gragson, driver of the No. 4 FRM Ford. “We just need to get a little better for the long run, and we’re up in the hunt, so that’s good.”
Intermittent clouds cooled the 74-degree afternoon, and, as Bowman alluded to, several of the fastest cars in practice did not necessarily fare as well in actual qualifying.
23XI Racing’s Bubba Wallace set the top pace in Group B practice, for example, but was only the ninth-quickest in qualifying. Legacy Motor Club’s Erik Jones, a fellow Toyota pilot, was second — just behind Wallace — in that practice session but ended up only 28th-quickest on the starting grid.
MORE: Weekend schedule, results: Homestead
Conversely, Kaulig Racing’s AJ Allmendinger, who was 25th-fastest in that Group 2 practice session, will start the race from 10th position. Berry, still basking in his first career win last week at Las Vegas, was 31st in practice but will start from the front row.
Defending race winner Tyler Reddick was 20th in qualifying. Kyle Larson will roll off 14th in the No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet.
Joe Gibbs Racing’s Christopher Bell, the season’s winningest driver, was 16th in qualifying. A three-time winner already, he is trying to become only the third driver in NASCAR modern day history — joining Hall of Famers Bill Elliott (1992) and Dale Earnhardt (1987) — to win four of the opening six races.
Bubba Wallace leads Cup Series practice
23XI Racing’s Bubba Wallace topped the leaderboard in practice at 166.955 mph, besting Legacy Motor Club’s Erik Jones (166.826 mph) and Hendrick Motorsports’ Kyle Larson (166.713 mph).
Noah Gragson (166.626 mph) and Christopher Bell (166.507 mph) rounded out the top five.
MORE: Cup Series practice results
Chase Briscoe (166.466 mph), Alex Bowman (166.328 mph), Denny Hamlin (166.287 mph), Tyler Reddick (166.220 mph) and Michael McDowell (166.077 mph) completed the top 10.
Wallace also led the way in the 10-consecutive-lap-averages category in the No. 23 Toyota.
Contributing: Staff reports