Greg Biffle takes surprise pole at Daytona

Biffle earned his first Sprint Cup victory in the 2003 race on the 2.5-mile superspeedway. His first career pole came here six months later in the Daytona 500. 

And on Friday, following a four-year drought in qualifying, Biffle won the pole for the 2016 Coke Zero 400 with a speed of 192.955 mph. His last pole came in the fall race at Charlotte Motor Speedway in 2012.

"I can't tell you how proud I am of you,” Biffle said over the radio. “Thank you very much. Thank you Jimmie Fennig.”

After climbing from the car, Biffle added, “I’m really excited for the whole team. Everybody is working extremely hard. I’m just happy to be driving it.”

For Biffle it was his second pole at Daytona and his 13th career Sprint Cup pole.

Carl Edwards will share the front row with his former Roush Fenway Racing teammate. Edwards was the ninth driver to qualify and jumped to the provisional pole with a lap of 192.748 mph. 

Kyle Busch rebounded nicely after wrecking his primary car in Happy Hour with less than 10 minutes remaining in the session. Busch posted the third fastest lap — 192.336 mph — followed by the Fords of Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (192.320 mph) and Brad Keselowski (192.254 mph). Austin Dillon was the fastest Chevy with a speed of 192.254 mph. 

Matt Kenseth (192.234 mph), Jimmie Johnson (192.160 mph), Denny Hamlin (191.975mph), Kurt Busch (191.865 mph), Joey Logano (191.400 mph) and Ryan Blaney complete rows four through six.

“It’s a good effort by everybody on this team,” said Blaney, who ran a lap of 191.253 mph). “I’m looking forward to racing tomorrow.”

Round 1

Greg Biffle rolled off 27th but jumped to the top of the speed chart after posting a lap of 192.629 mph. 

Although Biffle realized the No. 16 Ford EcoBoost had speed earlier in practice, even the veteran was surprised by his qualifying run.

“No I didnt think it was going to be that fast,” said Biffle after his run. “We had a lot of speed in the Daytona 500. We’re happy to come back with that same type of speed. That was probably the best lap I could put up. I hope I can do another one…we need a win. This would be a great place to do it.”

Brad Keselowski was second of five Fords transferring to the second round with a lap of 192.419 mph. Austin Dillon was third (192.098 mph) in a Chevy followed by the Toyotas of Carl Edwards (192.082 mph) and Matt Kenseth (192.061 mph).  

For Kyle Busch, it was a remarkable run. After rolling the back up car off of the No. 18 hauler around noon on Friday, five hours later he was temporarily sitting second on the speed chart with his lap of 191.538 mph. Busch was eventually bumped by Kenseth and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (seventh), but his time held up for eighth. 

The Chevys of Jimmie Johnson and Kurt Busch broke up the Toyota parade with laps of 191.432 mph and 191.314 mph, respectively. The drivers ended up ninth and 11th, respectively, Ryan Blaney (191.412 mph) moved up to 10th after 41 cars took laps. Daytona 500 winner Denny Hamlin was the last car to transfer to the final round. 

Defending Coke Zero 400 winner Dale Earnhardt Jr. (191.071 mph) was on the bubble after Logano, who was the 34th car to post a lap. Earnhardt was bumped when Aric Almirola jumped temporarily to 11th with a speed of 191.115 mph. The No. 88 Chevy will start 16th

Chase Elliott’s run of restrictor plate poles ended with two. His lap of 190.359 mph held up for 24th.

After Regan Smith rolled off seventh, NASCAR delayed qualifying when fluid was spotted dripping off the No. 7 Chevy. The Tommy Baldwin Racing team pushed the car behind the wall to check the engine after Smith aborted his lap and never attempted a second run.

“We had something happen as we crossed the start-finish line, the engine changed pitch,” Smith said. “We’ll race hard, get a top 10 so kids eat free at Golden Corral.” 

Josh Wise failed to make the race after posting a lap of 184.106 mph.