By Roy J. Akers- Skyviewsports.net
With NASCAR moving into Dover for week ten of 36 of the NASCAR season, trends have emerged and surprises have Cup fans scratching their heads. We also have quotes from a few drivers from media interviews this morning.
Kyle Larson is leading the CUP series in points by a wide margin. One hundred and sixty points (163) is a landslide and this includes only one win to William Byron’s three. Larson had a DNF early in the season but he leads the circuit with five stage wins and 531 laps led. Only Denny Hamlin and Martin Truex Jr. are within 150 laps of Larson. That is domination
Kyle Busch Claims First Pole Win of the Season at Dover Motor Speedway–
Kyle Busch became Team Chevy’s third NASCAR Cup Series pole winner of the 2024 season at Dover Motor Speedway – posting a best-lap of 22.196 seconds, at 162.191 mph, in his No. 8 FICO Camaro ZL1 qualifying to take the pole position.
· The pole marks Busch’s second career, and second consecutive, NASCAR Cup Series pole at Dover Speedway – both recorded behind the wheel of a Chevrolet.
· The feat is Busch’s 34th career pole in NASCAR’s premier series – a record that ties Fonty Flock for 22nd all-time on the series’ all-time pole win list. Busch’s quote on the award is below.
William Byron has won three times this season and has not led the first of second stages all season. What Byron has done is finish with four top tens, seven top tens and he has only led 149 laps this season.
Martin Truex Jr. has done everything but win a race in 2024. He is the defending champion at Dover and has three top 20’s at the track since 2021. Truex Jr. has only one stage win in 2024 but has led several races this season and is third in total laps led behind only Kyle Larson and Denny Hamlin. This is a race Truex would like to run up front most of the day. Truex Jr. gives his thoughts coming back to Dover. “Yeah, it’s always nice to come back to Dover (Motor Speedway) – a place where I’ve had a lot of success. It’s been a good track for me over the years, so we’re excited about it. We’ve had really fast cars all year long. Not quite been able to get the win yet, but I feel like we’ve been right there and our time is coming, and hopefully this weekend we can do what we did last year.”
Kyle Busch became Team Chevy’s third NASCAR Cup Series pole winner of the 2024 season at Dover Motor Speedway – posting a best-lap of 22.196 seconds, at 162.191 mph, in his No. 8 FICO Camaro ZL1 qualifying to take the pole position.
· The pole marks Busch’s second career, and second consecutive, NASCAR Cup Series pole at Dover Speedway – both recorded behind the wheel of a Chevrolet.
· The feat is Busch’s 34th career pole in NASCAR’s premier series – a record that ties Fonty Flock for 22nd all-time on the series’ all-time pole win list.
For all the complaining by Kyle Busch, he is NOT out of making the playoffs. Busch has indeed had a less than Kyle Busch future HOF season. Busch is 17th in the standings, just one spot out of the playoffs.
Media Availability Quotes:
Joey Logano is 15th in points and would make the playoffs going into this weekend. He has run in the top ten three times this season and has led 199 laps going into Dover.
Quotes from drivers
ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 48 ALLY CAMARO ZL1, met with the media in advance of the NASCAR Cup Series practice and qualifying session at Dover Motor Speedway. Tomorrow’s WÜRTH 400 will mark Bowman’s 300th career NASCAR Cup Series start.
OBVIOUSLY YOU MISSED THE RACE HERE AT DOVER MOTOR SPEEDWAY LAST YEAR DUE TO INJURY. HOW EXCITED ARE YOU TO BE BACK AT A TRACK THAT YOU’VE HAD SO MUCH SUCCESS AT IN THE CUP SERIES?
“Yeah, for sure. I think this is always one that I’ve had circled. I was excited last year to get to come here again and obviously that didn’t pan out. But yeah, really, this is my favorite racetrack that we go to. I struggled greatly here for a long time, and then got to be teammates with Jimmie Johnson for a couple of years and honestly have been pretty successful ever since a conversation we had in 2019. So yeah, really excited to get back here, and hopefully we unload fast and are a threat for the win tomorrow.”
Jimmie Johnson
With your success at the track here in Dover, is there any extra motivation or expectation this weekend in Dover?
“It is just so different. I realized that quickly at Texas. I have a few wins at Texas, and that didn’t carry in. It is really on me. It is such a different environment as a driver and to spot these drivers in the garage a two-year head start on the little nuances that you need from the prep side on a Tuesday, all of the way to the completion on a Monday, when you debrief and work through it all. There is just a lot of distance to make up, and first and foremost, I need to do my part and get in tune with this car. Through this stretch, I will be able to do so.”
Qualifying Quotes
Kyle Busch after winning the Pole
How big of a momentum boost can this be?
KB: “I mean I would certainly love for it to be a huge one; getting our season rolling and back in the right direction. I feel like the last couple of weeks, the discussions at RCR, me and Randall (Burnett), everybody, has just kind of been like – OK, let’s get some sort of a reset going here. We feel like Dover (Motor Speedway) and Kansas (Speedway) are certainly those weeks for us that we definitely want to work towards and put our focus on to get ourselves righted, and it seems to be going well, so far. Really excited about the car and the speed that it had. Coming off the truck and the way that it felt, there’s definitely some things that we can be better with or improve upon, but I feel like the changes that we made from practice into qualifying were good. Being able to go a tick faster in the second round over the first round was certainly huge for our qualifying effort and being able to sit on the pole today, so all of that worked out really well.”
MICHAEL MCDOWELL, No. 34 The Pete Store Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “I lost a lot of grip that second run, more than I anticipated. I just got into one and when I landed just started to walk up the track a little bit. I was just a little bit too tight that second round. I probably needed to back it up just a little bit and maybe it would have landed better, but it was close. You’re just hoping you get the changes right for that second round not really knowing what it was gonna do, but I feel good about it. I feel good about our speed. Tomorrow is gonna be a hot race and will be a lot different than today, so I’m not reading too much into practice. We had good pace, so that’s what we needed.”
RYAN BLANEY, No. 12 Wurth Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “We were close. I thought we had enough of a car for the pole and it was hard to tell how much the track was gonna slow down the second run. I made two laps the first round and I think that kind of hurt us. I think most guys in the top handful only made one lap and that helped them out, but I’m proud of the effort. I wish I could do my first lap over again. I think I could have hit it a little better, but we have a good car and we’ll see what we have tomorrow.”