NASCAR Update: Michael McDowell Wins His First Pole at the Ambetter Health 400 in Atlanta

Going into the second race of the NASCAR Cup Series season at Atlanta Motor Speedway, Michael McDowell has handed himself a big boost. The Front Row Motorsports driver has clinched himself a pole position for tomorrow’s main event. McDowell narrowly missed out on the pole position in the season’s opener at Daytona, but has now come out firing on all cylinders at Atlanta.

It took McDowell 467 attempts to secure his first-ever pole position in the NASCAR Cup Series. Once again, it will be a Ford front row at Atlanta as Joey Logano bagged himself no.2 spot on the grid. The likes of Kyle Busch, Todd Gilliland and Kyle Larson complete the top-five placings at the start of tomorrow’s race.

Michael McDowell looking to back his qualifying results with a good performance

McDowell jumped to the top of the qualifying session with an average lap speed of 178.844 mph. In doing he was able to edge past Joey Logano who had an average lap speed of 178.422 mph. The drivers completing the top -10 positions are Ryan Blaney, Chris Buescher, Austin Cindric, Chase Briscoe, and Austin Dillon.

Expressing his delight on winning his first Cup Series pole, McDowell via Motorsports, said, “That’s awesome. I’m just very proud of all the men and women at Front Row Motorsports. Two weeks in a row we’ve gotten on the front row. We’ve got a really fast Ford Mustang.”

The 39-year-old added that now that his team has delivered big time, he will need to back it up with good results going into the race. “That was a good lap but it really comes down to team and execution. They’ve done a really done a good job. Now, we need to back that up with a really good job tomorrow.”

Out of all the teams and drivers, Ford managed to secure a total of seven spots of the available top-10. Whereas the Toyotas who themselves have an upgraded Camry XSE failed to get any of its driver to the final round.

Mustang dominant against the new Toyota Camry’s once again

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The 2024 Cup Series season saw two of its manufacturers roll out their new cars. Ford came up with its Mustang Dark Horse, while Toyota launched its new Camry XSE. Daytona 500 saw Ford cars take up the front row, but Toyota made a comeback during the Duels. However, for a second time in a row, it’s Ford cars again leading the grid for the Atlanta race. None of the Toyota cars came close to matching Mustang’s speed.

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It was Martin Truex Jr. who had the best run driving the Camry, but could only manage a 12th place in the starting positions. The JGR driver, explaining Ford’s domination, said, “I don’t think we’re really surprised the Fords were up front in qualifying. We were 27th last week, 12th today. Really enjoy racing here. It’s a lot of fun and I have high hopes for tomorrow.”