Almirola beats Stenhouse for Atlanta Cup pole

Bowyer was the fastest in the lone practice session Friday, then topped the first two rounds of knockout qualifying before Almirola raced to the top of the leaderboard in the final round.

Almirola’s average lap speed of 181.472 mph ended up the fastest lap of the day and he won the pole for Sunday’s Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race at Atlanta.

The pole is the second of Almirola’s career and first of the new season.

“It’s cool to be the first guy to put the Ford Mustang on the pole,” Almirola said. “We’re running wide-open now, so it’s getting more and more about the car now in qualifying.

“It’s the engineers and all the guys who work on the cars. It’s about details. As the rules get tighter and tighter, it’s really about all the little things, all the little details.”

Ricky Stenhouse Jr. ended up second (180.428 mph) and Bowyer was third (180.410 mph). Denny Hamlin will start fourth and Daniel Suarez fifth.

Rounding out the Top 12 starters are Kyle Busch, Kyle Larson, Kurt Busch, Martin Truex Jr., Austin Dillon, Jimmie Johnson and Michael McDowell.

At start of the final round, Bowyer and Dillon ended up drag racing down pit road to be the first out on the track. Neither of them ended up benefiting from the move.

Round 2

Bowyer and his SHR teammates continued their dominance in the second round.

Bowyer again topped the session with an average lap speed of 180.504 mph, followed by Saurez (180.316 mph) and Almirola (180.164 mph). McDowell and Larson completed the top-five.

Also advancing to the final round were Stenhouse, Kurt Busch, Hamlin, Kyle Busch, Austin Dillon, Truex and Johnson.

Among those who failed to advance was last year’s race winner, Kevin Harvick – the only SHR car not to make it to the final round.

“It’s been a rough day. We’ve changed everything on the car and nothing has fixed it,” Harvick said of a steering problem that plagued him both in practice and in qualifying.

Also not advancing were Ryan Newman, Erik Jones, William Byron, Alex Bowman, Brad Keselowski, Chase Elliott and Matt DiBenedetto.

Round 1

Bowyer, who was fastest in Friday’s lone practice session, led the way in the first 10-minute knockout qualifying session.

Bowyer’s average lap speed of (180.733 mph) topped his SHR teammate Almirola (179.778 mph). Newman ended up third (179.737 mph). Larson was fourth and Austin Dillon completed the top-five.

Rounding out the Top 12 were Jones, Kurt Busch, Hamlin, McDowell, Johnson, Kyle Busch, William Byron and Corey LaJoie.

Among those who failed to advance to Round 2 were Ryan Blaney, Joey Logano, Daniel Hemric, Ryan Preece and Chris Buescher.

“Just out there running full throttle and just wasn’t fast enough,” Blaney said.

The No. 36 Ford of Matt Tifft and No. 52 Chevrolet of B.J. McLeod both failed pre-qualifying inspection twice and both teams had their car chief ejected for the remainder of the weekend. Each team will also lose 15 minutes of practice on Saturday.

Cla	#	Driver	Manufacturer	Time	Gap	Mph
1	10	Aric Almirola	Ford	30.550		181.473
2	17	Ricky Stenhouse Jr.	Ford	30.727	0.177	180.428
3	14	Clint Bowyer	Ford	30.730	0.180	180.410
4	11	Denny Hamlin	Toyota	30.744	0.194	180.328
5	41	Daniel Suarez	Ford	30.763	0.213	180.216
6	18	Kyle Busch	Toyota	30.810	0.260	179.942
7	42	Kyle Larson	Chevrolet	30.827	0.277	179.842
8	1	Kurt Busch	Chevrolet	30.835	0.285	179.796
9	19	Martin Truex Jr.	Toyota	30.852	0.302	179.697
10	3	Austin Dillon	Chevrolet	30.869	0.319	179.598
11	48	Jimmie Johnson	Chevrolet	30.900	0.350	179.417
12	34	Michael McDowell	Ford	30.915	0.365	179.330
13	6	Ryan Newman	Ford	30.906	0.356	179.383
14	21	Paul Menard	Ford	30.908	0.358	179.371
15	20	Erik Jones	Toyota	30.929	0.379	179.249
16	88	Alex Bowman	Chevrolet	30.952	0.402	179.116
17	24	William Byron	Chevrolet	30.979	0.429	178.960
18	4	Kevin Harvick	Ford	30.991	0.441	178.891
19	2	Brad Keselowski	Ford	30.998	0.448	178.850
20	95	Matt DiBenedetto	Toyota	31.029	0.479	178.672
21	13	Ty Dillon	Chevrolet	31.048	0.498	178.562
22	9	Chase Elliott	Chevrolet	31.061	0.511	178.487
23	38	David Ragan	Ford	31.111	0.561	178.201
24	32	Corey Lajoie	Ford	31.148	0.598	177.989
25	47	Ryan Preece	Chevrolet	31.097	0.547	178.281
26	12	Ryan Blaney	Ford	31.119	0.569	178.155
27	22	Joey Logano	Ford	31.145	0.595	178.006
28	8	Daniel Hemric	Chevrolet	31.156	0.606	177.943
29	43	Darrell Wallace Jr.	Chevrolet	31.196	0.646	177.715
30	37	Chris Buescher	Chevrolet	31.323	0.773	176.995
31	36	Matt Tifft	Ford	31.376	0.826	176.696
32	15	Ross Chastain	Chevrolet	31.502	0.952	175.989
33	00	Landon Cassill	Chevrolet	31.512	0.962	175.933
34	96	Parker Kligerman	Toyota	31.534	0.984	175.810
35	77	Garrett Smithley	Chevrolet	32.598	2.048	170.072
36	51	Cody Ware	Chevrolet	32.950	2.400	168.255
37	52	B.J. McLeod	Chevrolet