NASCAR: 2021 Coca-Cola 600 qualifying – Full starting lineup

The starting lineup for Sunday’s Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway is set following an actual NASCAR qualifying session.

For the second NASCAR race weekend in a row, fans could forget about the starting lineup formula.

A real qualifying session set the starting lineup for last Sunday’s road course race at Circuit of the Americas, and another one this afternoon set the starting lineup for tomorrow evening’s oval race at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

It was Hendrick Motorsports’ Kyle Larson who took the pole position for tomorrow’s Coca-Cola 600 at the four-turn, 1.5-mile (2.414-kilometer) oval in Concord, North Carolina.

He did so by recording a top lap speed of 180.282 miles per hour (29.953 seconds) behind the wheel of his #5 Chevrolet.

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Set to start alongside him on the front row in second place behind the wheel of his #47 Chevrolet is JTG Daugherty Racing’s Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

Chevrolet drivers swept the top four and six of the top seven positions, with Hendrick Motorsports taking three of the top four and four of the top seven spots. Hendrick Motorsports teammates Chase Elliott and William Byron qualified in third and fourth place behind the wheels of their #9 Chevrolet and #24 Chevrolet, respectively, while Richard Childress Racing’s Austin Dillon qualified in sixth behind the wheel of his #3 Chevrolet and Hendrick Motorsports’ Alex Bowman qualified in seventh behind the wheel of his #48 Chevrolet.

Stewart-Haas Racing’s Kevin Harvick was the only non-Chevrolet driver who qualified inside the top seven. He qualified in fifth place behind the wheel of his #4 Ford. The top Toyota qualifier was Joe Gibbs Racing’s Martin Truex Jr., who qualified in eighth behind the wheel of his #19 Toyota.

This marked the first true single-car qualifying session since last May’s Coca-Cola 600. All qualifying sessions throughout the rest of the 2020 season were canceled.

Random draws were used to set the starting lineups for a time before they were replaced by the starting lineup formula, the same formula which has been used for most races this season.

NASCAR did see single-car qualifying for this year’s Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway back in February, but that only set the front row for the race. The Bluegreen Vacations Duels set most of the starting lineup for that event.

Qualifying was canceled for the dirt race at Bristol Motor Speedway back in late March, but heat races were slated to set the starting lineup for that event as opposed to a single-car qualifying session.

Then last weekend, NASCAR saw just the second qualifying session through 14 races this season. But again, this was not a single-car qualifying session, as the race was contested on a road course.

Here is the full starting lineup for the 2021 Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

Starting Lineup
1st – Kyle Larson
2nd – Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
3rd – Chase Elliott
4th – William Byron
5th – Kevin Harvick
6th – Austin Dillon
7th – Alex Bowman
8th – Martin Truex Jr.
9th – Daniel Suarez
10th – Ross Chastain
11th – Ryan Blaney
12th – Kurt Busch
13th – Brad Keselowski
14th – Denny Hamlin
15th – Tyler Reddick
16th – Joey Logano
17th – Christopher Bell
18th – Bubba Wallace
19th – Erik Jones
20th – Kyle Busch
21st – Chase Briscoe
22nd – Matt DiBenedetto
23rd – Cole Custer
24th – Michael McDowell
25th – Ryan Newman
26th – Corey LaJoie
27th – Chris Buescher
28th – Ryan Preece
29th – Anthony Alfredo
30th – Justin Haley
31st – Aric Almirola
32nd – Quin Houff
33rd – B.J. McLeod
34th – Cody Ware
35th – James Davison
36th – Garrett Smithley
37th – Josh Bilicki
38th – David Starr

Tune in to Fox at 6:00 p.m. ET tomorrow evening for the live broadcast of the Coca-Cola 600 from Charlotte Motor Speedway.