The NASCAR Sprint Cup Series finally got some practice time Friday morning in advance of Saturday night’s Coke Zero 400 at Daytona International Speedway.
And after 45 minutes of practice at the 2.5-mile track, Brian Scott was on top of the board with a lap of 199.349 miles per hour in his Richard Petty Motorsports Ford.
Austin Dillon was second at 199.344 mph in the No. 3 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet. Then came Brad Keselowski, Ryan Blaney and David Gilliland.
Given that some cars ran in faster drafting packs and some ran alone, the speeds they set were largely irrelevant to what we’ll see on track Saturday night.
Kyle Busch lost a right-rear tire on his No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota with nine minutes left in practice and crashed hard. Busch was uninjured, but he will have to go a backup car for the race.
The 45-minute Friday morning session came after rain caused havoc the day before. Happy Hour was scheduled for 5 p.m. ET, Thursday, but was rained out. In the day’s only practice, just eight drivers completed at least one lap before the rains fell.
Qualifying is scheduled today at 4:10 p.m. ET.
Practice results:
