For Immediate Release: Thursday, April 14, 2011
Rookie Ty Dillon Wins Menards Pole Award presented by Ansell for 3 Amigos 250 at Talladega
(TALLADEGA, Ala.) - A second superspeedway race meant a second superspeedway pole for ARCA Racing Series presented by Menards rookie Ty Dillon. Dillon drove the No. 41 Xinergy/Richard Childress Racing Development Chevrolet to a qualifying lap of 52.134 seconds (183.681 mph) to claim the Menards Pole Award presented by Ansell for the second time this season and the third time in his five ARCA starts.
Dillon will start Friday's 3 Amigos 250 from the familiar first position, just inside Kyle Fowler and the No. 15 Venturini Motorsports Chevrolet, who also qualified second at Daytona in February. Fowler completed his lap in 52.163 seconds (183.578 mph), late in the session under impending darkness. Dillon, 19, and Fowler, 18, each made their first superspeedway start in February; Dillon finished 11th and Fowler finished 16th.
"It wasn't much of my doing," Dillon said. "The guys just put a really good piece together and it showed. We had a fast car at Daytona earlier this year and they went home and found more speed. I knew we had the car capable of getting the pole and we just went out there and did it. I didn't have to do much. I just held the wheel and held down the pedal."
Though he's won two poles for two races in 2011, Dillon knows the road might not be as simple when the series moves away from the superspeedways, starting with the May 1 race at Salem (Ind.) Speedway, a 0.555-mile oval.
"I knew we'd have the equipment and the cars and the people, the resources and everything, but it puts it on my hands when we go to the short tracks and other tracks," he said. "These two tracks here put it (with) the guys working on the cars...and they've already proven themselves. For the rest of the season now, I've got to prove myself."
Fowler's start will be his seventh in the ARCA Racing Series.
"We definitely got a lot of momentum coming in from Daytona," said Fowler. "We were fast all day and fast at the test, and now we've got a great race car. I've just got to not make any mistakes and hope that we'll be up front at the end."
Fowler led 19 laps to start the race at Daytona, and hopes to again move from the second spot into the lead right away, especially after finding passing difficult in the late stages of the Daytona event.
"Considering we've got such a great race car, I'd love to be able to get out front," he said. "It's so hard to pass here. It's a lot about track position. I really just want to get out front and try to keep it there."
Tim George Jr. (No. 31 Potomac Family Dining Group/Applebee's Chevrolet) finished a career-high third at Talladega last season, and will have an opportunity to improve upon that result by starting from the third position.
Scott Lagasse Jr. (No. 25 Lauren Briant/University of Montevallo Toyota) is making his first ARCA Racing Series start since a 2008 win with Venturini Motorsports, and will start fourth in his return to the team.
Tom Hessert (No. 52 Federated Auto Parts Toyota) qualified fifth. Brandon McReynolds, Joey Coulter, Milka Duno, Bryan Silas, and 2001 Talladega winner Bobby Gerhart, who also won at Daytona in February, complete the top 10 of tomorrow's starting lineup.
Fellow Talladega winners Dakoda Armstrong (2010) and Frank Kimmel (2006) qualified 13th and 22nd, respectively.
Alabama native Grant Enfinger, who has two top-10 finishes at his home track in the last two seasons, will start 17th.
Maryeve Dufault had qualified third, but her No. 12 Tony Marks Racing Dodge failed post-qualifying inspection and will start the race 39th.
The 94-lap, 250.04-mile 3 Amigos 250 airs live on SPEED at 4 p.m. Central tomorrow, with live timing and scoring and live audio presented by ARCA Nation and WTDR Thunder 92.7 FM at ARCARacing.com.
The ARCA Racing Series will host a final, 45-minute practice at 9:30 a.m. Central on Saturday. Live timing and scoring will be presented by ARCA Nation at ARCARacing.com. The ARCA Racing Series presented by Menards has crowned an ARCA national champion each year since its inaugural season in 1953, and has toured over 200 race tracks in 28 states since its inception. The series tests the abilities of drivers and race teams over the most diverse schedule of stock car racing events in the world, annually visiting tracks ranging from 0.4 mile to 2.66 miles in length, on both paved and dirt surfaces as well as a left- and right-turn road course.
Founded by John Marcum in 1953 in Toledo, Ohio, the Automobile Racing Club of America (ARCA) is recognized among the leading sanctioning bodies in the country. Closing in on completing its sixth decade after hundreds of thousands of miles of racing, ARCA administers over 100 race events each season in two professional touring series and local weekly events.
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