David Ragan Wins First NASCAR Busch Series Pole

The green flag for the O’Reilly 300 will drop at 2:15 PM CT Saturday. The race will be broadcast on ESPN2 and PRN Radio.

Salem-News.com SPORTS

FORT WORTH, Texas - David Ragan added to his rookie resume in the NASCAR Busch Series on Thursday as he captured the pole position for Saturday’s O’Reilly 300 at Texas Motor Speedway.

Ragan, driver of the No. 6 Discount Tire Ford for Roush Fenway Racing, landed his first pole position in only his 15th NASCAR Busch Series start.

Ragan paced the 1.5-mile superspeedway with a lap of 191.063 mph (28.263 seconds).

“This is an awesome run for the Discount Tire team,” Ragan said. “We’re just getting where we can work good together, and we’re having a lot of fun. And I have to tell you, the biggest thing that probably helped us get the pole today was not jumping back and forth from the Cup car to the Busch car.

“Texas Motor Speedway is one of my favorite race tracks. I’ve got as many laps around this track as I do anywhere. We had two solid runs last year in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck races here. I felt coming into this weekend if we could get a car handling well this could be one of our highlights for the year, and we’re off to a good start.”

Current Busch Series point leader and NEXTEL Cup Series regular Carl Edwards will start from the second position, courtesy of his lap of 189.354 mph (28.518 secs.).

NEXTEL Cup drivers Kyle Busch, Casey Mears and Kasey Kahne round out the top five starting positions, respectively.

The green flag for the O’Reilly 300 will drop at 2:15 PM CT Saturday. The race will be broadcast on ESPN2 and PRN Radio.

O’Reilly 300 Qualifying Results:

1. David Ragan, 191.063

2. Carl Edwards, 189.354

3. Kyle Busch, 188.719

4. Casey Mears, 187.872

5. Kasey Kahne, 187.696

6. Denny Hamlin, 187.552

7. David Reutimann, 187.461

8. Mark Martin, 187.259

9. Jeff Burton, 186.968

10. Matt Kenseth, 186.929

11. Jon Wood, 186.780

12. David Gilliland, 186.683

13. Greg Biffle, 186.677

14. Juan Pablo Montoya, 186.567

15. Paul Menard, 186.496

16. Stephen Leicht, 186.445

17. Steve Wallace, 186.303

18. Kurt Busch, 186.278

19. Ward Burton, 186.226

20. Shane Huffman, 186.175

21. Jamie McMurray, 185.803

22. David Stremme, 185.797

23. Kevin Harvick, 185.771

24. Jason Leffler, 185.363

25. Regan Smith, 185.280

26. Bobby Hamilton Jr., 185.109

27. Kyle Krisiloff, 184.571

28. Brent Sherman, 184.401

29. Marcos Ambrose, 183.842

30. Timothy Peters, 183.499

31. Brad Keselowski, 183.343

32. Mike Wallace, 183.163

33. Bobby Labonte, 182.599

34. Eric McClure, 182.156

35. Johnny Sauter, 181.684

36. Reed Sorenson, 181.220

37. J.J. Yeley, 181.062

38. Justin Diercks, 180.156

39. Brad Coleman, 179.826

40. Stanton Barrett, 178.873

41. Kevin Lepage, 178.601

42. Dave Blaney, provisional

43. Brett Rowe, 175.439

DNQ: Robert Richardson Jr.

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