NASCAR at Las Vegas qualifying, starting lineup: Joey Logano wins his second pole in three races to start 2024

Logano's 30th career Cup pole gives him a front row start in all three races in 2024 so far

By Steven Taranto

Mar 2, 2024 at 4:50 pm ET • 2 min read

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Joey Logano won the pole for the Pennzoil 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in qualifying on Saturday, putting down a lap of 29.291 (184.357 MPH) in the final round of qualifying to earn his second pole and third front row start to begin the 2024 season. Logano won the pole for the Daytona 500 to open the season, then followed it up with a second-place qualifying effort at Atlanta.

In doing so, Logano becomes the first driver to qualify on the front row for all three races to begin a season since Ricky Rudd in 2000. That year saw Rudd qualify on the outside of the front row for the Daytona 500 and then the next week at Rockingham before winning the pole for the third race of the season, also at Las Vegas.

Logano's pole comes after and despite an impropriety on his qualifying last week, in which NASCAR found that the two-time Cup champion had been using an altered glove containing webbed fabric as a means of gaining a potential aerodynamic advantage. Logano was fined $10,000 for using gloves not compliant with SFI-approved standards, and NASCAR officials exhibited the gloves in the garage area on Saturday noting the safety and competition violations it presented.

NASCAR displays the confiscated glove from the No. 22. pic.twitter.com/OSOkRoQEEG
— NASCAR (@NASCAR) March 2, 2024

Logano would end up pacing a qualifying session that featured extremely high winds and exhibited the out-of-box strength of both of NASCAR's new body types for 2024. In addition to Logano, three other Ford Mustang Dark Horses -- Austin Cindric in third, Chase Briscoe in sixth and Chris Buescher in ninth -- made the final round of qualifying, as did four Toyota Camry XSEs in Bubba Wallace (fifth), Martin Truex Jr. (seventh), Ty Gibbs (eighth) and Christopher Bell (10th). Kyle Larson in second was the fastest qualifying Chevrolet.

While one Connecticut driver in Logano will lead the field to green on Sunday, another in Ryan Preece will be forced to start from the rear of the field. Preece crashed in turn two in the opening minutes of practice and did not make a qualifying attempt, and neither did J.J. Yeley or Justin Haley. Yeley's car failed pre-qualifying inspection twice on top of a number of other issues, leading to the ejection of crew chief Bryan Berry due to the No. 44 NY Racing team's lack of a car chief.