CUP: Newman Fast In Pocono Practice

Sprint Cup

CUP: Newman Fast In Pocono Practice

Ryan Newman has 47 career NASCAR Sprint Cup poles...

Tom Jensen | Posted August 05, 2011 Long Pond, PA

Ryan Newman showed the way in Friday afternoon’s opening round of NASCAR Sprint Cup practice at Pocono Raceway, with a lap of 170.026 miles per hour in his No. 39 Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet.

Newman, who has 47 career Cup pole positions, was fastest of the 46 cars setting times in the first of two practice rounds today. Second-fast was Kurt Busch, 168.621 mph in the No. 22 Penske Racing Dodge, with the No. 43 Richard Petty Motorsports Ford of AJ Allmendinger third at 168.517 mph.

Completing the top five were Carl Edwards, the newly re-signed Roush Fenway Ford driver, and Mark Martin in the No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet.

Jimmie Johnson was sixth, followed by David Ragan, Paul Menard, Kyle Busch and Brad Keselowski, the latter of whom is driving with a fractured ankle.

The second round of practice will be from 4-5:30 p.m. ET and will be televised live on SPEED.

Qualifying is Saturday morning.

Tom Jensen is the Editor in Chief of SPEED.com, Senior NASCAR Editor at RACER and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. You can follow him online at twitter.com/tomjensen100.

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