Tony Stewart qualified third. Green flag: 1:30 p.m. ET.
MORE: 10 drivers to watch at Michigan | Stewart’s best shot yet at victory
Maybe there’s magic left in the man at the wheel of the No. 14 car. Stewart must win a race in this, his final season as a driver, to make the Chase for the Sprint Cup. And on Friday, Smoke showed his fire still burns.
Other surprises in Friday’s qualifying? How about Ryan Blaney qualifying fifth, ahead of ballyhooed fellow rookie Chase Elliott, who will start 10th?
Denny Hamlin will start fourth. Dale Earnhardt Jr. will start 27th, two places behind Danica Patrick.
Joey Logano and Tony Stewart (Getty Images)
Sunday’s FireKeepers Casino 400 begins after 1 p.m. ET from Michigan International Speedway. Logano has yet to win a race this season, so this could be his chance to secure a Chase berth.
MORE: What to watch for at Michigan | Slipping into NASCAR’s next evolution
Logano led all three qualifying rounds. He did the same at Charlotte and Pocono, only to be nipped in the final session. Not this time.
“The last couple ones have stung a lot. We won the first two rounds and came in second in the last one," Logano said. “So we figured it out. We won the same amount of rounds, but the right one, the one that counts.”
Stewart missed the season’s first eight races after breaking his back in a Jan. 31 off-road accident in the California desert. He, as Kyle Busch did in 2015, received dispensation from NASCAR with a provision that he must win a race and finish in the top 30 in points to qualify for the Chase. He enters Michigan in 36th, 71 points behind David Ragan in 30th.
“It is definitely a good position to be in for here,” Stewart said. “This is a track where track position means so much anyway. We are at least off to a good start right now.”
Qualifying was not without its problems. Four cars were kept off the track, one of them Truex’s, until they cleared technical inspection. The session was stopped twice early, once when something fell off a car, the other because of a crash.
