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Posted 06/07/2012 at 05:31 PM
The final test session on Pocono Raceway’s new pavement saw the top speeds of the three sessions ran with Kasey Kahne topping the charts at 179.480 mph. Most of the top speeds obtained by the drivers came because they ran a lot of laps in qualifying trim.
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Jamie McMurray was second fastest (179.401), followed by Mark Martin (179.390), Jeff Gordon (179/272) and Paul Menard (179.005).
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The most impressive of the three sessions has been A.J. Allmendinger who finished with the seventh best speed in the afternoon, but was blazing fast in the first two sessions. He has probably the best chance he's ever had coming into a race to finally capture his first career Cup win.
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Martin has also been very fast in every session and looks to be in good shape to possibly get his first career win at Pocono. Martin has started 50 races at Pocono over his long career with 19 top-five finishes that includes being runner-up six times, a bridesmaid mark that has him tied with Bobby Allison for most runner-ups at a track without a win.
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The two Earnhardt-Ganassi cars look vastly improved from what we’ve seen out of them for the first 13 races this season and it wouldn‘t be surprising to see them run well Sunday based on the testing.
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The Richard Childress stable also was very strong and we could see all three of their cars contending for a win. I like to lump The Brickyard and Pocono together as being the most similar and Menard is the defending Brickyard 400 winner. Couple his run last year at Indy with his great testing and there is plenty reason to believe that Menard could make some noise on Sunday.
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The surprisingly slow drivers of the sessions were Jimmie Johnson and Carl Edwards. Johnson finished the day with 19th fastest lap in the early session and 21st in the afternoon. Edwards was 34th early and 30th in the afternoon. Johnson should be alright, but Edwards might be in trouble.
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"This is only the second day of testing," Edwards said Thursday. "Bob (Osborne) and I are over there almost coming to blows over there. I’m saying, ‘We’ve got to go faster.’ And he’s like, ‘We’ve got a test plan. We’ve got to stick to our plan.’ I’m like, ‘No, we’ve got to go faster.’ So he has a way of working through everything and by the end of tomorrow if we’re not good, then maybe it’s time to make some big changes to the car.
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"But right now we’re just going through the plan and I’m trying my hardest when I get out of the car to walk by and kind of put the blinders on and not look at the sheet because I know we’re testing and not going for all-out speed, but Mark Martin is fast. I followed him a little bit and he’s very spectacular in that car.”
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This is only testing and it's quite possible that several teams used it in the same manner Osborne did with Edwards' car, but we'll definitely find out more on Friday when the first official practice begins at 12:30 pm (ET) where the only game plan is to be fast. Chances are, Allmendinger and Martin will again be fast.
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