Jimmie Johnson will start on the pole for the first time this season after winning Thursday night's qualifying for the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Johnson, the six-time and defending Sprint Cup Series champion, made a lap around this 1.5-mile racetrack at 194.911 mph, which was the fastest lap during this three-round knockout qualifying session. The driver of the No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet earned his 33rd career pole in the series, including his fourth at Charlotte.
Brad Keselowski held the provisional pole with his lap at 194.567 mph until Johnson topped it with less than two minutes to go in the final qualifying round. Keselowski, the 2012 series titleholder, will start on the front row in a Sprint Cup race for the seventh time this season.
Johnson has won a points-paying race at Charlotte six times, but hasn't scored a victory here since October 2009. Three of his wins at this track occurred in the Coca-Cola 600 -- NASCAR's longest race of the season. He won them consecutively from 2003-05.
Johnson, currently seventh in the point standings, has yet to win a race this season.
His teammate, Kasey Kahne, qualified third, while Danica Patrick took the fourth spot. Clint Bowyer was fifth.
Patrick had her best qualifying finish of the season and the second-best of her Sprint Cup career. She won the pole for the 2013 Daytona 500. Patrick posted the fastest lap in round 2 of qualifying at 194.595 mph.
Denny Hamlin, Kyle Busch, Joey Logano, Marcos Ambrose and Dale Earnhardt Jr. were sixth through 10th, respectively, in qualifying.
Kevin Harvick, who won this race one year ago, and Matt Kenseth did not get on track in time to post a lap during the final five-minute round. Harvick will start 11th and Kenseth 12th.
Jamie McMurray, who won last weekend's NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race at Charlotte, qualified 26th, one spot ahead of Jeff Gordon, the current points leader and winner of the most recent points-paying race -- May 10 at Kansas.
J.J. Yeley and Dave Blaney failed to qualify.
There is no track activity at Charlotte on Friday. Sprint Cup teams will have two more practice sessions on Saturday (one in the morning and the other in the afternoon). Sunday's 600-mile race is scheduled to start shortly after 6 p.m. ET.
[SportsNetwork.com]
