BK Qualifies 19th, Will Run in Duel 1

After a short night at the track on Saturday, due to a wreck in the Sprint Unlimited, Brad Keselowski and the No. 2 crew were right back at Daytona International Speedway on Sunday, qualifying for next Sunday’s Daytona 500, and although BK kept the Deuce from consecutive catastrophes by avoiding the day’s only wreck, he was unable to lock up the front row position he desired for the Great American Race.

BK ran well early in the event, which featured a group qualifying format for the first time. The Deuce had a Top 4 time on the board at one point, and advanced to the second round. But in that second round, the White Lite didn’t have the speed necessary to advance to the final round missing the Top 12 cut-off by a several spots as BK finished 19th.

Qualifying for the Daytona 500 is unique in the fact that it only sets the front row for the 500, not the rest of the field. Each other placement after the top two merely locks in the drivers’ starting spot for one of Thursday’s two Budweiser Duels. BK’s 19th place finish locked him into Budweiser Duel No. 1, which he’ll start from P9. Jeff Gordon went on to take the pole for the Daytona 500 and teammate Jimmie Johnson will start alongside him on the front row.

But the story of the day was the controversial new group qualifying format. Last season, NASCAR instituted knockout qualifying at every race but the Daytona 500, and the results were positive, with a few exceptions: the Superspeedways, where group qualifying created a messy situation in both sessions at Talladega and the summer race at Daytona.

The two tracks, both require cars to use restrictor plates, which lend themselves to pack racing making qualifying individually at high speeds a challenge. Group qualifying is designed to fix that problem, allowing drivers to draft during qualifying. But it also comes with risks, most notably the odds of a rare qualifying wreck. Still, NASCAR decided to implement the group qualifying format for Sunday’s session. Brad was asked what he expected before climbing into his car and noted that it was hard to predict how things would play out with so many variables.

“I really don’t know what we’re going to see here,” Brad told FOX Sports. “I think what you’re going to see is it’s going to take a lot of luck and tiny bit of skill…probably like playing rock-paper-scissors. There’s a little bit of skill involved, but not much. But that’s not to take away from whoever gets the pole today. It’s a huge accomplishment. It’s still Daytona. We all want to win and we all want to win every event we can, whether it’s a race or qualifying.”

With each driver hungry to secure their spot in The Great American Race, it didn’t take long for the new format to create drama.

BK’s No. 2 Miller Lite Ford Fusion was part of the first group to go out onto the track during qualifying and his first lap was fourth fastest of the 25 cars on the track. However, just a few turns of the track later, two of his fellow competitors, Clint Bowyer and Reed Sorenson tangled when Sorenson attempted to block Bowyers’ attempt to pass him. The wreck resulted in both Bowyer’s No. 15 car and Sorenson’s No. 44 car being totaled, and caused damage to Denny Hamlin’s No. 11, Bobby Labonte’s No. 32 and J.J. Yeley’s No. 23 car.

It also had an impact on the rest of the field because it halted the first session of the opening round of qualifying with 1:22 remaining. That time would’ve allowed for the drivers to put down two more laps, which likely would’ve been their fastest as they continued to gain speed. Instead the remaining drivers had to attempt to get back up to speed in that short window and couldn’t, so their first round times were effectively set at the time of the crash.

At the time, Brad was eighth of 25, teammate Joey Logano was 10th of 25 and Ryan Blaney, who will run the 500 for Wood Brothers Racing through a partnership with Team Penske, was fifth. All three drivers wound up advancing to the second round, but the wreck put them on shaky ground as they waited out the results of the second session of the first round, involving the 24 other drivers looking to qualify.

“You need to get all the laps in you can get in because every lap keeps getting faster,” Brad told FOX’s Matt Yocum. “When you have a wreck…you lose your last two or three laps that might be the fastest. No one was able to get back out because you couldn’t get enough speed. But it’s just all part of the game. We did a good job controlling what we could control. All three cars are close to making it to the next round but I wouldn’t put any guarantees on it.”

Blaney’s No. 21 wound up 17th while Kes’ No. 2 and Logano’s No. 22 just made the cut at 20th and 22nd of 24 respectively.

The other part of the group qualifying format that mystified was the mind games on pit road before rolling out to the track. Each driver waited for the other to make the first move, creating a cluster of cars just sitting. The hope for each driver was to be as far back in a pack as possible, after practice proved that the tail car in a drafting line produced the best speed and time. At the outset of the second round, the field froze on pit road for two full minutes.

But with just three minutes remaining in the round, Brad made the first move and rolled off pit road with Blaney and Logano in tow. But that moved proved costly as the rest of the cars followed shortly thereafter. From the head of the field, the No. 2, No. 22 and No. 21 had no help in the draft and wound up getting passed just before the final lap, leaving them in no-man’s land over the course of the final turn around the speedway. Brad finished 19th among the 24 drivers, Blaney was 20th and Logano was 21st.

Though BK was disappointed to fall short of the front row starting spot he’d set his sights on, the end result means little beyond that in the long run. The Deuce still has a Top 10 starting spot for Budweiser Duel No. 1 on Thursday, and the No. 2 crew will have plenty of time to tweak their setup and get him up to speed before then.

NEXT UP

All teams will take two days away from the track before heading back on Wednesday for a pair of practice sessions for those Budweiser Duels. The first is a 45-minute session beginning at 2 p.m ET and the second is a 40-minute session beginning at 3:15 p.m. ET. Both can be seen on Fox Sports 2.

Then the White Lite team gets one more chance to tune up for the Duels on Thursday with practice at Noon ET. on Fox Sports 1. Coverage of Budweiser Duel No. 1 begins at 7 p.m. ET. on Fox Sports 1.

After the starting order is determined, there will be three more chances to tune-up for the 500. Friday features practice sessions at 11 a.m. ET and 2 p.m. ET on Fox Sports 1 and Saturday’s happy hour final practice begins at 10:30 a.m. ET on FS1.

Coverage of The Great American Race, the Daytona 500 is slated to begin at Noon ET. on FOX and the green flag will fly at 1:20 p.m. ET.