DARLINGTON, S.C. — Brad Kese lowski won the pole for the NASCAR Sprint Cup race Sunday at Darlington Raceway, where he’ll start up front for the first time all season while searching for his first Southern 500 victory.
Keselowski turned a lap at 178.874 mph Saturday to earn his first pole of the season. The Team Penske driver put his Ford in the top starting spot five times last year, but this marks just his third front-row starting spot of 2015.
“It’s probably the biggest pole I’ve ever had as far as what the track means,” Keselowski said. “I’ve always thought of Darlington as one of the elite tracks.”
Kurt Busch qualified second in a Chevrolet for Stewart-Haas Racing and was followed by teammate Kevin Harvick. Busch has qualified on the front row five times this year. Martin Truex Jr. of Denver-based Furniture Row Racing sped to a seventh-place qualifying effort and will start on the inside of Row 4.
Keselowski is hoping to use the Southern 500 as a springboard into the Chase for the Sprint Cup championship. It’s the next-to-last race of the regular season.
But he wasn’t about to get too comfortable before the prestigious Sunday night race on one of the most challenging tracks on the NASCAR circuit.
Its quirky layout — the 1.366-mile layout is shaped like an egg instead of a symmetrical oval — puts most cars against the wall and struggling to avoid smacking it.
The track already has claimed its share of victims this weekend: Kyle Busch hit the wall in practice Friday and went to a backup car, Danica Patrick’s team was pulling out a backup after she hit the wall in qualifying, and Greg Biffle’s crew was fixing damage from Saturday.
“This track is so challenging as a race-car driver, you make one mistake and you can take a fast race car and make it a ball of wrecked metal,” Keselowski said.
