Briscoe Leads the Starting Grid for the Coca-Cola 600
Chase Briscoe secured the pole position for the Coca-Cola 600, NASCAR’s longest and most demanding race, and will start on the front row alongside Kyle Larson.
Briscoe, driving the No. 19 Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing, set a lap of 182.852 mph on the 1 1/2-mile oval at Charlotte Motor Speedway, outpacing Larson, who is scheduled to arrive at the circuit approximately one hour before Sunday night’s race, after competing in the Indianapolis 500.It’s going to be great to start up front. Adding the No. 1 starting position and being able to run in clean air is huge.
Chase Briscoe
Briscoe, who has achieved four top-five finishes in this year’s Cup Series, has yet to secure a victory.
He also won the pole position for the Daytona 500 earlier this year.
It’s pretty wild, honestly. I never thought I’d get to run a Truck Series race, let alone lead in two crown jewel events.
Chase Briscoe
William Byron, who signed a four-year contract extension with Hendrick Motorsports on Friday, celebrated by setting a lap of 182.642 and will start third, followed by Chris Buescher and AJ Allmendinger. Rounding out the top 10 will be John Nemechek, Ty Gibbs, Noah Gragson, Alex Bowman, and the defending race champion, Christopher Bell.
Briscoe is aware that winning the pole position for the Coca-Cola 600 doesn’t necessarily guarantee success, especially in such a long race.Larson won from the pole in 2021, but before that, the last driver to achieve that feat was Jeff Gordon in 1998.
Bell won last year’s race, shortened by rain, of 249 laps, and now seeks to prove it wasn’t a fluke.
Certainly, it has bothered me that people call it an asterisk win, so I would love to win this race like the Coca-Cola 600 and run the full 600 miles. We should be very competitive. In the last two years, this has been one of our best intermediate circuits, as far as the group of 20 is concerned, so I’m looking forward to the challenge.
Christopher Bell
Last year, fans booed loudly after waiting through a lengthy rain delay, only for NASCAR to announce in the early morning hours that the race could not be completed due to the inability to dry the track.
I want to be a 600-mile winner and not get booed entering victory lane.
Christopher Bell
One thing to watch on Sunday will be how the track reacts to the race cars in Turns 3 and 4, as the drivers repeatedly spoke of how bumpy it is there.
Jimmie Johnson, in his 700th Cup Series start, will start in 37th place, as he tries to equal Darrell Waltrip as the driver with the most Coca-Cola 600 wins, with five. The Legacy Motor Group co-owner is largely considered an underdog, despite his tremendous success in the CMS, where he has also won the Bank of America 400 four times and the All-Star race four times.It’s definitely tough down there. It changes a little bit from year to year.
Chase Briscoe
I love endurance events and this is our marathon. As a kid, watching this before I ran here, I was always intrigued by a 600-mile race. The cars back then had a hard time. The drivers too. It’s a long event. I think it’s a little tougher on the party-going fans in the infield to go the extra 100 miles.
Jimmie Johnson
