NASCAR: Chris Buescher wins Dover Cup pole

Chris Buescher rolled to the first Busch Light Pole Award of his NASCAR Cup Series career in Saturday’s qualifying session at Dover Motor Speedway.

Buescher set the pace in the final 10-driver group, posting a best lap of 160.149 mph in the No. 17 RFK Racing Ford. He scored the organization’s first pole in nearly five years, dating back to May 2017 at Talladega, and he became the fourth first-time pole winner so far this season in the Cup Series.

“Really proud of everybody on this Fastenal team, they did a nice job getting the car dialed in throughout practice,” Buescher said. “We laid down some really good laps in qualifying obviously and are feeling really confident about the race. It’s a tough track but a fun one, and really neat to get my first NASCAR pole here at Dover.”

It marks Buescher’s first career pole in any NASCAR National Series. It is also RFK’s first pole in five seasons (2017 – Stenhouse – Talladega), and the first not on a Superspeedway since 2013 when Stenhouse earned the pole at Atlanta.

Buescher’s fast lap gives Jack Roush his eighth Cup pole at Dover all-time and first at the 1-mile track since 2008. Crew chief Scott Graves earns his third career pole in the NCS and first since 2018.

Denny Hamlin’s No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota will start second in Sunday’s DuraMAX Drydene 400 presented by RelaDyne (3 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). Hendrick Motorsports teammates Kyle Larson and Chase Elliott were fourth and fifth, respectively, and Team Penske’s Ryan Blaney wrapped up the top five.

Ross Chastain, last week’s winner at Talladega Superspeedway, was the leader in the first group of qualifying and will start seventh Sunday. Elliott was fastest in qualifying’s Group B. The top five from each group formed the 10-driver field that ran for the pole on the 1-mile concrete track.

Austin Cindric and Kurt Busch set the pace in each practice group Saturday morning at Dover, avoiding the multiple spins and crashes that plagued others.

Race Lineup