Ryan Blaney earned his first pole at Atlanta Motor Speedway. He qualified the No.12 BodyArmor Zero Sugar Ford for Team Penske with a speed of 179.371 mph and a time of 30.908 seconds.
Fellow Team Penske driver Austin Cindric will start alongside Blaney after qualifying second by a margin of .002 seconds in the No.2 Menards Ford. His lap speed of 179.359 mph equated to a time of 30.910 seconds.
“It’s a big testament to our whole group,” Blaney said. “It shows you how similar all of our cars are being right there together.”
The top-5 qualifiers were all Ford drivers. Third place was Josh Berry with a speed of 179.139 mph and a time of 30.948 seconds. He was followed by Joey Logano with a speed of 178.827 mph and a time of 31.002 seconds. Todd Gilliland rounded out the top-5 with a speed of 178.735 mph and a time of 31.018 seconds.
“It is nice to all start together. Hopefully we can control the first part of [the race],” Blaney said. “Fast cars and teamwork is why you see [Team Penske] leading a lot of laps and contending for these wins.”
The only Chevrolet driver in the top 10 was Kyle Busch, driver of the No. 8 Cheddar’s car, who qualified 6th for Richard Childress Racing with a speed of 178.626 mph and a time of 31.687 seconds.
Joe Gibbs Racing, last week’s pole-winning organization, was the biggest surprise of the qualifying session. The team’s highest qualifier was Chase Briscoe who came in 25th with a speed of 31.283 mph and a time of 177.533 seconds.
Georgia Favorite, Chase Elliott qualified 19th. His teammate and last week’s Daytona 500 winner, William Byron qualified 16th.
The AmBetter Health 400 begins tomorrow at 3 p.m. on Fox.