Home SPORTS NASCAR at Nashville live updates: Aric Almirola starting on the pole after qualifying

NASCAR at Nashville live updates: Aric Almirola starting on the pole after qualifying

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The NASCAR Cup race at Nashville Superspeedway is today. The Ally 400 starts at 3:30 p.m. on NBCSN.

The race is 399 miles (300 laps) with stages ending on laps 90, 185 and 300. All times are Eastern.

We’ll have the latest updates here. Follow NASCAR reporter Alex Andrejev on Twitter at @AndrejevAlex.

Stage 1

4:40 p.m., Lap 55: Ryan Blaney’s day ends early. He gets into the outside wall, saying the “rotor blew out” to bring out the next caution and exits his vehicle. Just before the flag, Kyle Larson passed Kyle Busch for first place.

4:25 p.m., Lap 48: Tyler Reddick brings out the caution while drivers are on pit road. He spun on the access road and says there’s dirt on the inside of his windshield. The order is Kyle Busch, Kyle Larson, Joey Logano, Chase Elliott, Kurt Busch and Aric Almirola for the restart. No. 5 crew chief Cliff Daniels tells Larson that his late call cost him some time and allowed Busch to pass them while on pit road, but they’re not behind by a lot.

4:19 p.m., Lap 30: Kyle Larson continues to lead. He’s up by 1.2 seconds on Kyle Busch. Then the order is Aric Almirola, Joey Logano, Cole Custer, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Matt DiBenedetto and Chase Elliott. Elliott says he’s lacking front turn.

4:11 p.m., Lap 15: Joey Logano radios to his team to check the right front after what appears to be contact with Aric Almirola. Ryan Blaney and Erik Jones have jumped up 11 positions after starting at the rear. Blaney says the track very slick after wiggling and his team tells him to take care of it and they’ll “take care of it.”

4:07 p.m., Lap 8: Kyle Larson surges to the lead after the restart. He lined up behind Busch on the outside, then sliced between Busch and Almirola for the lead. Busch drops to second, Almirola drops to third and Joey Logano is in fourth.

4:02 p.m., Lap 1: The race goes green briefly before the first caution comes out for a tire carcass that’s come off Quin Houff’s No. 00 car. Before the start Ryan Blaney drops to the rear on pace laps. He pits before the green flag due to damage to his left rear fender and gets back out for the start. Through the opening turns, Kyle Busch takes the lead from Aric Almirola as Chase Elliott moves to the outside to take the field three wide.

Pre-race ceremonies

3:50 p.m.: Pre-race ceremonies are complete and include a six-jet flyover. Twelve-time Grammy winner CeCe Winans delivers the pre-race invocation and Music City rising star Priscilla Block performs the national anthem. Country music artist Luke Combs then delivers the command to fire engines. The grandstands look close to full at the track with a weekend capacity of just under 40,000 people.

Race start delayed 10 minutes due to traffic

3:15 p.m: Traffic surrounding the track in Lebanon, Tenn. will cause NASCAR to delay the start of the race by 10 minutes to allow more fans to arrive before the green flag. The green flag is now scheduled to wave at 3:55 p.m. Traffic flow was reportedly an issue during earlier races this weekend.

Alvin Kamara joins NASCAR with a new role

2 p.m.: Alvin Kamara — yes, that Alvin Kamara; The NFL’s New Orleans Saints running back — announced Sunday that he’s joined NASCAR as the sport’s first Growth & Engagement Advisor. Kamara is at the track in Lebanon, Tenn. ahead of Sunday’s Cup race and told reporters that he has an office and keycard.

“I never had a job besides the NFL, so I’ve got two jobs now,” Kamara said. “(Saints head coach) Sean Payton is gonna have to give me some downtime.”

Kamara’s juice company, The Big Squeezy, sponsored an Xfinity Series car driven by Ryan Vargas for the race at the Daytona road course. Kamara became a major champion of the sport last year in response to NASCAR’s social justice advocacy and met with NASCAR president Steve Phelps during his first race at Homestead-Miami Speedway. He also attended this year’s Daytona 500.

Three cars dropping to the rear

1:30 p.m.: NASCAR announces that three cars will drop to the rear for the start of today’s race; Those three cars are driven by Erik Jones, who scrubbed the wall during qualifying, William Byron and Quin Houff. All three teams will drop to the back for the start due to unapproved adjustments. Byron was slated to start fourth, Jones was ninth and Houff was last.

Aric Almirola wins the pole

11:50 a.m.: No. 10 Stewart-Haas Racing driver Aric Almirola posted the fastest single qualifying lap this morning to win the pole position for this afternoon’s race. Almirola’s qualifying time was 29.557 seconds. He sits 28th in NASCAR’s point standings and earned his third pole start in his career. Almirola will start ahead of Kyle Busch in the front row. Joey Logano, William Byron, Kyle Larson, Chase Elliott, Cole Custer, Alex Bowman, Erik Jones and Ryan Blaney will also start in the top-10.

NASCAR at Nashville qualifying results and starting lineup

Order

Car No.

Driver

Time behind leader (sec.)

Time (sec.)

1

10

Aric Almirola

29.557

2

18

Kyle Busch

0.015

29.572

3

22

Joey Logano

0.026

29.583

4

24

William Byron

0.055

29.612

5

5

Kyle Larson

0.091

29.648

6

9

Chase Elliott

0.165

29.722

7

41

Cole Custer

0.195

29.752

8

48

Alex Bowman

0.254

29.811

9

43

Erik Jones

0.278

29.835

10

12

Ryan Blaney

0.28

29.837

11

21

Matt DiBenedetto

0.282

29.839

12

4

Kevin Harvick

0.341

29.898

13

11

Denny Hamlin

0.348

29.905

14

47

Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

0.368

29.925

15

2

Brad Keselowski

0.377

29.934

16

14

Chase Briscoe #

0.388

29.945

17

17

Chris Buescher

0.429

29.986

18

38

Anthony Alfredo #

0.441

29.998

19

42

Ross Chastain

0.446

30.003

20

37

Ryan Preece

0.47

30.027

21

23

Bubba Wallace

0.491

30.048

22

99

Daniel Suárez

0.541

30.098

23

34

Michael McDowell

0.547

30.104

24

7

Corey LaJoie

0.587

30.144

25

20

Christopher Bell

0.612

30.169

26

8

Tyler Reddick

0.65

30.207

27

77

Justin Haley

0.658

30.215

28

3

Austin Dillon

0.678

30.235

29

6

Ryan Newman

0.693

30.25

30

1

Kurt Busch

0.742

30.299

31

78

BJ McLeod

0.818

30.375

32

51

JJ Yeley

0.998

30.555

33

66

Chad Finchum

1.247

30.804

34

52

Josh Bilicki

1.264

30.821

35

19

Martin Truex Jr.

1.374

30.931

36

53

Garrett Smithley

1.534

31.091

37

15

Joey Gase

1.588

31.145

38

13

David Starr

2.134

31.691

39

Quin Houff

# rookie

How to watch NASCAR at Nashville

Race: Ally 400

When: Sunday, June 20

When: race at 3:30 p.m. ET

TV: NBCSN

Radio: MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio

Distance: 399 miles (300 laps) with stages ending on laps 90, 185 and 300

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