Chevrolet Silverado drivers swept the top three starting positions at Texas Motor Speedway (TMS) for the Winstar World Casino 400 and four of the top-five starting spots.
Johnny Sauter captured his first career NASCAR Camping World Series (NCWTS) pole position with a lap of 30.086 seconds and average speed of 179.485 m.p.h. He was followed by fellow Silverado driver and winner of the last two NCWTS races at TMS, Ron Hornaday, Jr. The runner-up position will be the best career start for Hornaday at TMS.
Johnny becomes the first rookie to sit on the pole in the Camping World Truck Series since Scott Speed at Bristol last fall.
Sauter's ThorSport Racing teammate Matt Crafton, No. 88 Australian Gold Silverado qualified third and Dennis Setzer, fresh off a runner-up finish at Dover, put the No. 8 Malcolmson Silverado in the fifth starting position.
Johnny Sauter, FUN SAND/CURB RECORDS/STAR DE AZLAN CHEVROLET, Qualified 1st
Johnny you are coming off a fifth place finish at Dover, your best finish of the season. Talk to us about any momentum that might have carried over from last week to this week. "Yeah, we struggled the first part of the year. We came out of the box really fast at Daytona and went to California and we were mediocre. We got totally embarrassed and got lapped twice in a one-hundred lap truck race. So we worked really hard and last week we took a new truck to Dover and did great there and the guys have been working really hard with me and we brought the same truck this week as we had last week at Dover and pretty much just changed a few things and it came super-fast off the truck.
I'm stoked. This is a big deal for me and obviously a big deal for Thorsport and the guys on the thirteen truck because its their first pole. Now all we got to do is close the deal tomorrow night and have a solid day. It feels good to be on the pole at Texas."
Talk about your grandmother, you mentioned her on the radio out there. "Yeah, she lives right in Dallas there so I flew in early yesterday morning and actually went over to her house and she is getting ready to turn ninety years old. So every time we come to Texas I get to go over there and hang out. My brother was fortunate enough to win a truck race here a few years ago and every time I come here I seem to struggle.
We've got a good start and my grandmother has lived here for forty-six years so she's been here a long time and I believe this will be the first time she has been unable to come out, but winning the pole is pretty cool."
Ron Hornaday, LONGHORN CHEVROLET SILVERADO, Qualified 2nd
Ron you are starting second tomorrow night and what your chances are for winning tomorrow night? "Kevin (Harvick) said that he was pretty happy with starting second because every time we win the pole, we don't win the race. I was told that it was our best start so far here, and last year we went out first and this year we went out first. I don't know if there is any advantage here after the sun goes down, maybe it gets a little more grip, but I'm pretty excited about seeing three Chevrolets up front with all Mark Smith motors and all Kevin Harvick Incorporated bodies on them. That says a lot for what we've been doing and how hard everyone has been working."
Ron, what do you think your odds are of knocking off three in a row here? "I don't play the Vegas odds so I really don't know. Last week we separated a tire from the truck so a top-five would make us really happy. Texas has been really good to me and we've got a good truck. This is the same truck that we won with both times here last year, so we've got a pretty good chance I would say."
