NASCAR driver wins his 3rd straight Kansas Speedway pole for Sunday playoff race

For once, Chistopher Bell thinks he has a car that’s race-worthy — as well as lightning-fast in qualifying — at Kansas Speedway.

Navigating the 1.5-mile track in 30.111 seconds (179.336 mph) during the final round of Saturday’s time trials, Bell edged Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Ty Gibbs (179.099 mph) by 0.040 seconds for the top starting spot in Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400, presented by ESPN BET.

The main event of the fall 2024 racing weekend is slated to begin at 2 p.m. Central Time Sunday on USA, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.

With his strong showing Saturday, Bell will start the first race of the NASCAR Cup playoffs’ Round of 12 from a familiar spot. He earned the Busch Light Pole Award at the track for the third consecutive race and fourth time overall.

“I’ll tell you what, it’s the people that work on this race car that made the statement,” said Bell, who claimed his second pole position this season and the 12th of his career. “We showed up with probably the best Kansas car we’ve ever had.

“It’s always been a great track for us to qualify, and it seems like whenever we go race, we’re always in the third-to-seventh range. Today it was different. It felt really, really good in practice. I felt really comfortable driving the car.”

Bell has never converted a pole into a victory at Kansas Speedway, a situation he hopes to correct on Sunday as the second round of the playoffs begins.

“The tough thing about Kansas is maintaining the balance,” Bell said. “This place, with these (Gen 7) cars, it swings really, really bad. You’ll start off really comfortable, and depending on how your car is, you might go really tight, you might go really loose.

“Typically, the fast lane is up top, but then you have to really adjust your line to what your balance is doing. I’ve got to drive a little bit better here (Sunday) than I have in the previous Kansas races, but I definitely have the car to do it.”

Bell enters the Round of 12 second in the standings, 24 points above the current cut line for the Round of 8. Coming off his dominating victory at Bristol, top-seeded Kyle Larson will start 11th on Sunday.

Gibbs and third-place starter Kyle Busch (178.643 mph) were the only two non-playoff drivers to advance to the final round during Saturday’s time trials.

Tyler Reddick, third in the standings, will occupy the fourth spot on the grid, followed by Joey Logano, William Byron, defending series champion Ryan Blaney, four-time Kansas winner Denny Hamlin, Chase Briscoe and Daniel Suárez.

Larson won the 2024 spring race at Kansas, while Reddick is the defending winner of this event.

Playoff drivers Alex Bowman, Austin Cindric and Chase Elliott will start 12th, 17th and 38th, respectively. Elliott was down a cylinder in practice and qualifying, necessitating an engine change.