LAS VEGAS — With a blistering lap at 187.156 mph in Saturday’s time trials at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Christopher Bell claimed the pole position for Sunday’s Pennzoil 400 presented by Jiffy Lube (4 p.m. ET, FS1, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Bell navigated the 1.5-mile intermediate track in 28.853 seconds to beat Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Denny Hamlin (186.188 mph) for the top starting spot by 0.150 seconds.
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The Busch Light Pole Award was Bell’s first of the season, his fourth at Las Vegas and the 15th of his Cup Series career.
RELATED: Starting lineup | At-track photos: Las Vegas
With JGR’s Ty Gibbs qualifying third at 185.803 mph and 23XI Racing’s Bubba Wallace fourth at 185.771 mph, Toyota swept the top four starting spots in a race for the seventh time in the manufacturer’s history in the Cup Series, with the previous most recent occurrence coming at Indianapolis Motor Speedway last year.
This was the second straight Las Vegas race in which Toyotas have started 1-2-3, with Hamlin, Chase Briscoe and Bell doing the honors in qualifying last fall.
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“It was pretty simple, really,” Bell said of his qualifying lap. “It takes a lot of commitment here at Las Vegas Motor Speedway to qualify well. My team got their Ps and Qs right. We had a lot of grip, and I held my foot down, and we won the pole.”
Bell’s car seemed unbothered by the troublesome Turn 1 bumps that upset the efforts of more than a few other competitors.
“It’s a compromise,” Bell explained. “Every time you come to Las Vegas Motor Speedway, it’s a compromise of getting your car to have as much grip as you can have in (Turns) 3 and 4 without the bump hindering you in (Turns) 1 and 2.
“Anytime you make the car drive better across the bumps, you’re giving up performance on the smooth part of the race track, and my team nailed it.”
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Reigning series champion Kyle Larson (185.548 mph) qualified fifth in the fastest Chevrolet, with Phoenix winner Ryan Blaney (185.185 mph) claiming the sixth spot on the grid in the top Ford.
Series leader Tyler Reddick, winner of the first three races this season, will start seventh, followed by Ryan Preece, William Byron and Chris Buescher.
Defending race winner Josh Berry qualified 32nd in the No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford.
Bell fastest in practice
Like qualifying, JGR drivers led the way in practice, with Bell topping the leaderboard at 184.062 mph and Denny Hamlin (183.436 mph) setting the second-quickest lap time.
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Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (183.299 mph), Wallace (183.175 mph) and John Hunter Nemechek (183.069 mph) rounded out the top five.
MORE: Practice results
Noah Gragson, William Byron, Kyle Larson, Carson Hocevar and Tyler Reddick completed the top 10.
Both sessions were completed without issues.
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