Christopher Bell Grabs Third Straight Kansas Cup Pole

Christopher Bell celebrates the Busch Light Pole Award Saturday at Kansas Speedway. (Rusty Jarrett/NKP for Toyota Racing photo)

KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Christopher Bell left no doubt about who had the fastest car in town Saturday at Kansas Speedway, leading both rounds of Busch Light Pole Qualifying en route to the best spot on the grid for the Hollywood Casino 400 presented by ESPN BET.

Bell laid down the fastest lap of the day in Group B of round one at 30.043 seconds (179.742 mph), then backed it up in the top-10 shootout with a time of 30.111 seconds (179.336 mph) for his third straight pole at Kansas and the 12th of his NASCAR Cup Series career.

Not only did it complete a season sweep of qualifying at the 1.5-mile Sunflower State oval for the Norman, Okla., native, it was Bell’s fourth Kansas pole overall in 10 Cup Series appearances there.

“I’ll tell you what, it’s the people that work on this race car that made a statement today,” said Bell after climbing from his No. 20 Rheem Toyota Camry XSE. “And today, we showed up with probably our best Kansas car we’ve ever had. It’s always been a great track for us to qualify at, and it seems like whenever we go race, we’re always in the third to seventh range here. But today it was different.

“It felt really, really good in practice, and I felt really comfortable driving the car,” Bell added. “The team was able to duplicate the qualifying balance in both rounds. … I have to drive a little bit better here tomorrow than I have at the previous Kansas races, but I feel like I definitely have the car to do it.”

Joining Bell on the front row for Sunday race is one of his Joe Gibbs Racing teammates in Ty Gibbs, who was eliminated from the Cup Series playoffs at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway a week ago but timed in as the fastest Group A qualifier in the final round at 30.151 seconds (179.009 mph).

Gibbs’ lap was the second-best overall among the 10 drivers that made the final round of qualifying.

Another non-playoff contender in Kyle Busch starts third alongside 23XI Racing’s Tyler Reddick, the regular season champion, with two-time Cup Series champion Joey Logano lining up fifth as the best Ford driver in Sunday’s lineup.

Five more playoff drivers in William Byron, defending series champion Ryan Blaney, Denny Hamlin, Chase Briscoe, and Daniel Suarez filled out the top 10 qualifiers that advanced through both rounds of time trials.

Hendrick Motorsports teammates Kyle Larson (Group B) and Alex Bowman (Group A) were the first drivers in their respective qualifying groups that failed to transfer into the pole round.

The duo will start 11th and 12th, respectively, Sunday afternoon. Larson missed the transfer by just six hundredths of a second, while Bowman was more than a tenth off the advancement time in his group.

Other notables starting deeper in the field include rookie Carson Hocevar (14th), playoff contender Austin Cindric (17th), Martin Truex Jr. (19th), Brad Keselowski (26th), and three-time Kansas winner Jimmie Johnson (35th).

After battling engine issues throughout practice, Chase Elliott qualified slowest among the 38 cars on site at 32.345 seconds (166.950 mph) with an ailing No. 9 UniFirst Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 and will start last after his team changes the motor prior to the first race of the Round of 12.

Broadcast coverage of Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400 presented by ESPN BET, the first race of the second Cup Series playoff round, is slated for 3 p.m. ET live on USA, the Motor Racing Network, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, channel 90.