Larson, McMurray 1-2, lift Ganassi at Sonoma
In the shadow of his hometown, Kyle Larson led a Chip Ganassi sweep of the front row by winning the pole for Sunday’s Toyota/Save Mart 350 at Sonoma Raceway, barely edging teammate Jamie McMurray.
Larson, who is from Elk Grove (Sacramento County), turned a lap at 95.295 mph Saturday and just nipped his teammate, who ran his qualifying lap at 95.204 in the Ganassi Chevrolet.
While McMurray is seeking his first win of the season, Larson is coming off a Cup win last week at Michigan — where he also started from the pole. In fact, Larson is on an incredible hot streak and, including his sprint car races, has four wins in the past two weeks.
“This is cool to get a pole on a road course at my home state,” Larson said. “This is my closest track to ... where I grew up. I have lots of friends and family here.”
Los Gatos native AJ Allmendinger qualified fifth for JTG Daugherty Racing, and Danica Patrick was sixth for Stewart-Haas Racing in her best qualifying run of the season.
“I feel like I can just drive this place in my sleep because I’ve driven so many laps here over the years,” Patrick said.
Formula One: Lewis Hamilton took the pole position from Valtteri Bottas with a brilliant last-gasp drive for a Mercedes 1-2 followed by Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen and championship leader Sebastian Vettel at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix in Baku. The British driver’s 66th pole
moved him one ahead of Formula One great Ayrton Senna and just two behind Michael Schumacher’s all-time record of 68. IndyCar Series: Helio Castroneves won the pole for Sunday’s IndyCar race in Elkhart Lake, Wis., turning in a lap time of 1:41.30 at Road America road course for his 50th career pole and third of the season as Team Penske took the top four spots. Briefly: Dominic Scelzi won the Boys & Girls Club Dirt Track Classic, the 30-lap main event at the half-mile Calistoga Speedway; race host Rico Abreu finished third, and Tony Stewart was 10th . ... Rookie William Byron grabbed the lead with just over 20 laps and won his first series victory in the NASCAR Xfinity race at Iowa Speedway, a stand-alone race with no Cup regulars in the field.