LAS VEGAS (AP) — This time last week observers were questioning what was wrong with Joe Gibbs Racing as the team stumbled out of NASCAR's opening gate and parked in the back end of the garage as a team struggling in the Cup Series rankings.
Then three JGR drivers finished in the top-five in Phoenix and rolled that momentum into Las Vegas Motor Speedway, where their trucks were repositioned with the rest of the title contenders. The team didn't slow down and Christopher Bell led a Toyota qualifying march that saw JGR drivers sweep the top three starting positions.
Bell took the pole for Sunday's race with a lap at 187.156 mph to put the No. 20 Toyota on the pole ahead of JGR teammate Denny Hamlin, who turned a lap at 186.188.
Ty Gibbs qualified third as JGR swept the top three spots and Toyota dominated the session: Bubba Wallace of 23XI Racing was fourth in a Toyota, which had five drivers in the top seven. Daytona 500 winner Tyler Reddick, winner of the first three races this season, was seventh for 23XI.
It is the fourth time since 2007 that Toyota has swept the top four spots in a qualifying session.
Bell, runner-up to winner Ryan Blaney last week in Phoenix, is hoping to maintain his speed and finally get a win at Las Vegas. He now has won the pole at the 1.5-mile speedway three previous times, but only has a pair of runner-ups and a third-place finish to show for his work.
“It’s a really competitive track for my group and my team. Hopefully one of these days we’re going to get to victory lane," Bell said. "It’s a great race track for me, so I enjoy coming out here and competing at Las Vegas.”
Keselowski continues to recover
The hardest part of recovering from a broken leg for Brad Keselowski has been the physical therapy and not driving a race car.
Keselowski broke his right femur in December when he slipped on ice during a family ski trip and needed a can at the start of the season to get around the track. He found the most relief he gets is when he climbs inside the No. 6 Ford, and then when he gets out of the car, the pain returns.
“I’m just jamming in all the PT work with some of the best professionals you could hope to work with, and I’m building stronger every week, but not as fast as I want to," Keselowski said. "Driving the race car is both a blessing and a curse. It’s a blessing because it provides the motivation for me to really push my rehab and do things faster, which is not a bad thing.
"It’s a curse because, yes, when I get in the car, it does hurt. It does pull me backward. When I have the adrenaline and all those things, I don’t notice it. But when it wears off, yeah, I’ve got to recover from that.”
The Cup Series schedule the last three weeks — Austin, Texas, Phoenix and now Las Vegas — have not helped Keselowski, nor did the crash he was in Saturday at Phoenix during practice.
"The long airplane flights to the West Coast and the crash on Saturday were not my friends,” Keselowski said. “I’m trying not to be over the top about it, but I’ve got a lot of hardware in my leg that’s holding it together. If that hardware were to come loose, it would be problematic for me at this time. But the surgeons and everyone did such an incredible job that that hasn’t been the case. I’m knocking on wood right here that stays the case and I’ll keep checking.”
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