Joey Logano wins pole for Sunday's Pocono 400

http://blogs.mcall.com/groller/ FROM KEITH GROLLER Joey Logano will be on the pole for Sunday's Pocono 400 at Pocono Raceway after recording a track record qualifying time of 50.112 seconds and 179.598 miles per hour. But Logano was hardly alone in obliterating the old track record of 172.533 mph set by Kasey Kahne in June of 2004. In total, 36 drivers broke Kahne's qualifying record on the newly-paved surface at Pocono. Mc-pocono-goodyear-tire-test-0425-02 The 22-year-old Logano, who drives the Home Depot Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing, earned the fourth pole of his career (second at Pocono) and first of this season. This will be his seventh top-10 start in 2012. "My guys have done a really good job focusing here from the tire test [in April] to the testing we had over the past few days and we really focused on getting our car handling right," Logano said. "We went down a lot of different routes and all three of our [Gibbs] teams did that. We found something we like and we've all kind of gone together. The Home Depot car is fast. It's good in qualifying trim and it'll be good in racing trim. "It's going to be good. Anytime you can be out front in clean air is good." Logano, who has never finished higher than 11th in six career Sprint Cup starts at Long Pond, is looking for his second career win. He hasn't won a race since New Hampshire in 2009. Logano He will be joined on the front row by Carl Edwards, who clocked in at 50.317 and 178.866 mph. "Joey had to go show off for everybody and do what he did in practice," Edwards said. "I have to give him credit. For me it's very difficult to run a fast lap yesterday and go through the night and think about every thing and then come back in pretty difficult conditions and back that time up. I didn't back up my time from yesterday, but Joey did. He did a really good job. "I'm extremely pleased we get to start up front. A lot of people were complaining with how long we were here with all of the practicing. But I am not complaining at all. We needed every day we were here to get faster. So, I'm pretty excited aboout the race." Paul Menard is third, Kyle Busch fourth and four-time Pocono winner Denny Hamlin is fifth. Busch and Hamlin are also Gibbs Racing drivers. "Up until this point, this is probably the most important qualifying session of the year," Menard said. "It's going to hard to pass and we put a lot of emphasis on qualifying. I got a loose on Turn 3 and lost some time, but still probably couldn't have caught Joey. I'm really glad we're starting on the inside." Among other notables, Dale Earnhardt, Jr. will start eighth, last year's winner Jeff Gordon will start 12th, defending series champ Tony Stewart will start 22nd, points leader Greg Biffle will start 13th, and last week's winner at Dover, Jimmie Johnson, will start 24th.