Jimmie Johnson Takes Pocono Pole

Jimmie Johnson

Jim Garrahan/AutoRacing1

After winning from the pole last week in Indianapolis, Jimmie Johnson grabbed the Coors Light Pole for the Sunoco Red Cross Pennsylvania 500 this Sunday with a speed of 168.215 mph. It is the 16th pole for Johnson. Mark Martin grabbed the outside pole for an all Chevrolet front row, while David Gilliland, Jeff Gordon and Matt Kenseth rounded out the top five.

"That was a great lap for us. The car was really comfortable. I knew coming to the green that I was going to be in good shape. We got the balance right for all three turns and this Lowe’s Impala was really working great. We had a really good practice session this morning, but we felt like we could improve the car. The guys made some great decisions and it pretty much paid off" said Johnson of his qualifying effort, "we really improved on things since last spring and where we are on the race car. I think we've gone in the right direction. There has been a lot of hard work throughout all of Hendrick Motorsports and it's nice to see it coming together. I'm glad I did my job and hit my marks. It's a very technical track, a lot like Indy, where it's easy to miss one of the corners. We got a great lap and feel really good about that", said Johnson of his qualifying effort."

When asked about his chances of repeating a win from the pole similar to last week at Indy, "We didn't do any race practice so I'm not sure how we'll be in the race, but I have a sneaky suspicion we'll be all right."

After winning from the pole at Pocono in the June race, Kasey Kahne qualified 7th as the second fastest Dodge as Ryan Newman qualified 6th fastest.

Results

Failed to Qualify – Chad Chaffin