As happens regularly in NASCAR, when a driver has a new sponsor (Sports Clips), Denny Hamlin bested Ryan Newman to claim his first Coors Light Pole award of the season in Saturday night’s qualifying session for the Emory Healthcare 500 Sprint Cup Series race at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

Hamlin’s lap of 187.380 mph in the no. 11 SportsClips Toyota Camry was enough to top Newman - a seven-time Atlanta pole winner - and earn his eighth career pole and his first since last October’s race at Auto Club Speedway.

Newman retained the outside pole, while Kyle Busch qualified third with a top lap of 187.063, followed by Carl Edwards (186.881) and Tony Stewart (186.881).

Newman held the top spot early in the qualifying session after coming onto the track as the third qualifier and posting a lap of 187.070 mph and looked to have the top spot locked up until Hamlin took to the track late in the session.

Hamlin’s pole marks his best Atlanta start since 2006, but he has yet to win at the 1.5-mile track.

“It wasn’t perfect, but I knew it was a good lap,” said Hamlin. “My heart was racing going down the backstretch because I knew I hit turn one pretty good. I had to check up a little in three and four to keep it on the bottom. I’m not a qualifier and any of my fans know that. I’ve been very, very happy with it. I’m typically a really bad qualifier, but I definitely think we have a heck of a race car this weekend.”

Hamlin currently sits fifth in the points standings with two races remaining before the cutoff for the Chase for the Sprint Cup begins.

Although not locked into the 12-driver Chase field, Hamlin is in position to qualify for the Chase for a third straight season, and can clinch a spot in the Chase with a finish of 22nd or better in Sunday night’s race.

“Our Chase starts this weekend,” said Hamlin. “We’re bringing the best stuff that we have starting right now. We’re not waiting till the Chase, we’re bringing what we have to see where we’re going to stack up, competition-wise, these next two weeks. Obviously, we brought our best stuff here. We never qualify on the pole, we never qualify in the top-10 so this is a great step and a good sign for our team.

“These next two weeks we’re bringing everything that we’ve got to the race track, the best stuff that we have and see how we’re going to stack up against the competition these next two weeks.”

Losing the pole position, Newman also missed out on a chance at history, looking to beat the record set by Buddy Baker as the all-time leader in poles at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

“We got a chance to do the Goodyear tire test, which I think definitely played to our hand,” said Newman. “I think we have a good race package as well. With all that being said, we are second. We will start up front and hopefully finish up there.”

Martin Truex, Jr., Jimmie Johnson, Juan Pablo Montoya, David Ragan and Kasey Kahne rounded out the top ten qualifiers. Jason Leffler, Landon Cassill, Scott Riggs and Todd Bodine failed to qualify for the event.

Lineup

POS	CAR	DRIVER	MAKE	SPONSOR	SPEED	TIME	BEHIND
1	11	Denny Hamlin	Toyota	Sport Clips	187.380	29.587	Leader
2	39	Ryan Newman	Chevrolet	U.S. Army Reserve	187.070	29.636	-0.049
3	18	Kyle Busch	Toyota	Pedigree	187.064	29.637	-0.050
4	99	Carl Edwards	Ford	Aflac	186.881	29.666	-0.079
5	14	Tony Stewart	Chevrolet	Office Depot / Old Spice	186.881	29.666	-0.079
6	56	Martin Truex Jr.	Toyota	NAPA Auto Parts	186.818	29.676	-0.089
7	42	Juan Montoya	Chevrolet	Huggies	186.711	29.693	-0.106
8	48	Jimmie Johnson	Chevrolet	Lowe's / Kobalt Tools	186.711	29.693	-0.106
9	6	David Ragan	Ford	UPS	186.692	29.696	-0.109
10	9	Kasey Kahne	Ford	Budweiser / Valvoline	186.667	29.700	-0.113
11	2	Kurt Busch	Dodge	Miller Lite	186.234	29.769	-0.182
12	1	Jamie McMurray	Chevrolet	McDonald's	186.171	29.779	-0.192
13	00	David Reutimann	Toyota	Aaron's Outdoors Mossy Oak	186.128	29.786	-0.199
14	33	Clint Bowyer	Chevrolet	BB&T	186.040	29.800	-0.213
15	16	Greg Biffle	Ford	3M Scotch-Blue Painter's Tape	185.978	29.810	-0.223
16	43	A.J. Allmendinger	Ford	Insignia HDTV / Best Buy	185.972	29.811	-0.224
17	5	Mark Martin	Chevrolet	Carquest / GoDaddy.com	185.238	29.929	-0.342
18	24	Jeff Gordon	Chevrolet	Jeff Gordon Children's Foundation / DuPont	184.911	29.982	-0.395
19	98	Paul Menard	Ford	Quaker State / Menards	184.892	29.985	-0.398
20	82	Scott Speed	Toyota	Red Bull	184.757	30.007	-0.420
21	77	Sam Hornish Jr.	Dodge	Mobil 1	184.726	30.012	-0.425
22	19	Elliott Sadler	Ford	Stanley	184.671	30.021	-0.434
23	46	Michael McDowell	Chevrolet	Whitney Motorsports	184.603	30.032	-0.445
24	71	Bobby Labonte	Chevrolet	TaxSlayer.com	184.572	30.037	-0.450
25	88	Dale Earnhardt Jr.	Chevrolet	National Guard / Amp Energy	184.437	30.059	-0.472
26	31	Jeff Burton	Chevrolet	Caterpillar	184.431	30.060	-0.473
27	78	Regan Smith	Chevrolet	Furniture Row Companies	184.333	30.076	-0.489
28	12	Brad Keselowski	Dodge	Penske Racing	184.290	30.083	-0.496
29	29	Kevin Harvick	Chevrolet	Shell / Pennzoil	184.272	30.086	-0.499
30	17	Matt Kenseth	Ford	Crown Royal Black	184.186	30.100	-0.513
31	20	Joey Logano	Toyota	The Home Depot	184.143	30.107	-0.520
32	47	Marcos Ambrose	Toyota	Little Debbie	184.058	30.121	-0.534
33	83	Reed Sorenson	Toyota	Red Bull	183.503	30.212	-0.625
34	87	Joe Nemechek	Toyota	FrontRowJoe.com	183.097	30.279	-0.692
35	26	Patrick Carpentier	Ford	Air National Guard	183.055	30.286	-0.699
36	37	David Gilliland	Ford	Taco Bell	183.043	30.288	-0.701
37	38	Dave Blaney	Ford	A&W All American Food	182.982	30.298	-0.711
38	36	J.J. Yeley	Chevrolet	Tommy Baldwin Racing	182.904	30.311	-0.724
39	55	Mike Bliss	Toyota	Prism Motorsports	182.880	30.315	-0.728
40	21	Bill Elliott	Ford	FordParts.com	182.380	30.398	-0.811
41	13	Casey Mears	Toyota	GEICO	182.326	30.407	-0.820
42	132	Jason Leffler	Toyota	Braun Racing	181.777	30.499	-0.912
43	09	Landon Cassill	Chevrolet	Phoenix Construction	181.562	30.535	-0.948
44	66	Scott Riggs	Toyota	Prism Motorsports	181.123	30.609	-1.022
45	34	Travis Kvapil	Ford	Long John Silver's	181.111	30.611	-1.024
46	164	Todd Bodine	Toyota	Gunselman Motorsports	181.029	30.625	-1.038
47	7	Kevin Conway*	Toyota	Extenze	177.573	31.221	-1.634

+ Set by Owner Points
* Denotes Rooki