JOLIET, Ill. — Erik Jones finally captured his first NASCAR XFINITY Series pole of the season during Saturday’s knockout qualifying session for the TheHouse.com 300 at Chicagoland Speedway.
Jones toured the 1.5-mile D-shaped oval in 30.469 seconds (177.229 mph) to put his No. 20 NBA 2K17/GameStop Toyota out in front of the field for the 13th time in his XFINITY Series career, as well as the first at Chicagoland.
Most of the Byron, Michigan native’s time over the field came in Turns 3 and 4, something that surprised him.
“It was honestly really tight down there,” Jones said of the far end of the track. “I was wondering whether we were going to get it or not … so we a good job all three rounds. The GameStop Camry was fast and we made good adjustments between the first and second round and also the second and third round.”
“That’s my first XFINITY pole all year; it’s so nice to finally get one. Hopefully, we can keep this speed going. We were really good in practice yesterday; I was really happy with the car, too, so we’ll see where it all goes. It’s definitely nice to be starting up front. … It should be a fun race, I’m really looking forward to it.”
Jones’ Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Daniel Suarez will join him on the front row, qualifying second in the No. 18 Comcast Business/Juniper Toyota with a best lap of 30.512 seconds (176.980 mph).
Kyle Larson was the highest-placed Chevrolet in third (30.543/176.800), followed by the Ford of Ryan Blaney in fourth (30.556/176.725), giving Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series regulars a sweep of the first two rows.
Cole Custer was the fastest XFINITY Series points contender and completed the top five in the No. 00 Haas Automation Ford (30.595/176.499).
Regular season champion Elliott Sadler timed in sixth-quick, followed by Matt Tifft, William Byron, Daniel Hemric, Ryan Reed, Blake Koch and Brennan Poole among the drivers who made it through all three rounds of knockout qualifying.
Austin Dillon was the first driver who fell below the cut line at the end of the second round, posting a best time of 30.847 seconds (175.058 mph) in the No. 2 Rheem Chevrolet and falling just a hundredth of a second short.
However, the biggest name to miss the final round was championship hopeful Justin Allgaier, who landed 14th in the No. 7 BRANDT Professional Agriculture Chevrolet for JR Motorsports.
Other notables eliminated in round two were Brandon Jones (15th), Darrell Wallace Jr. (16th), Ty Dillon (17th) and bubble drivers Brendan Gaughan (19th) and Dakoda Armstrong (20th).
J.J. Yeley was the first driver knocked out in the opening round and will start 25th (31.754/170.057).
The TheHouse.com 300 from Chicagoland Speedway takes the green flag at 3:30 p.m. ET, live on NBCSN, the Motor Racing Network and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, channel 90.
Full qualifying results can be viewed on the next page…
