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Bob PockrassNASCAR
LONG POND, Pa. — Daniel Suarez won his first career NASCAR Cup Series pole Saturday but had to wait about 30 minutes to find out that he won it.
The native of Mexico was the third fastest in qualifying at Pocono Raceway but was awarded the pole after the cars of the top two drivers, Kevin Harvick and Kyle Busch, failed post-qualifying technical inspection.
Denny Hamlin, who originally qualified seventh, will start beside Suarez as five of the top seven cars were among those that failed inspection.
“It feels good because we haven’t been running well lately,” said Suarez, 20th in the Cup series standings. “We have made the top 12 in qualifying the last month, but we haven’t raced well.
“It definitely feels good. I feel like this is just the beginning of the weekend. We have to keep it up. The real business is tomorrow. We have to keep this rolling and have a strong run and stay in the front.”
As part of a two-day schedule NASCAR is experimenting with at select races this year, this was the second event in which NASCAR did not put the cars through tech prior to qualifying.
Instead, with it being an impound race — teams can’t alter the cars following the race — NASCAR is doing one combined qualifying and prerace tech after qualifying.
Harvick (who failed the body scanning station) and Busch (who failed the chassis station) had their times disallowed and will start Sunday’s race at the rear, where all those who failed post-qualifying inspection will line up by owner points.
Kyle Larson, who was set to start fourth, also failed tech, as did the fifth-place car of Joey Logano. Midway through the tech process, 10 cars had passed and 10 had failed. Others who failed: William Byron (who qualified sixth), Austin Dillon (12th), Jimmie Johnson (15th), Paul Menard (17th), Aric Almirola (19th) and Bubba Wallace (22nd).
Suarez said he was studying video of his qualifying run when he found out the others had failed tech.
“I was watching some data and watching some stuff of the 18 [of Busch] and the 4 [of Harvick] how they got a little faster than me,” Suarez said. “I was trying to figure out for next time, doing my notes.
“And then [my PR person] called and said I had to go to the media center.”
All those cars that fail postqualifying tech must eventually pass tech Saturday night. A second failure would result in a crew member, chosen by NASCAR, ejected for the weekend. A third failure would be a 10-point penalty.