NASCAR lineup at Atlanta: Starting order, pole for Sunday's race without qualifying

Tom Gatto

NASCAR lineup at Atlanta: Starting order, pole for Sunday's race without qualifying image

The starting lineup for Sunday's NASCAR Cup Series race at Atlanta Motor Speedway was set by applying the statistical formula NASCAR is using for the majority of its 2021 races.

Drivers' starting positions for the Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500 (3 p.m. ET; Fox, TSN, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) were based on four factors:

  • Driver's finishing position from the previous race (25 percent)
  • Car owner's finishing position from the previous race (25 percent)
  • Team owner points ranking (35 percent)
  • Fastest lap from the previous race (15 percent)

Below is the starting lineup for Sunday's NASCAR race on the 1.5-mile track at Atlanta, which was set without qualifying.

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Who won the pole for the NASCAR race at Atlanta?

Denny Hamlin, the Cup Series point leader after five races, is the pole-sitter based on the math. His Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Martin Truex Jr., last weekend's winner at Phoenix, will start second.

Hamlin leads the series with four top-five finishes and three stage wins, but he has yet to win a race this season.

The rest of the top 10 after Hamlin and Truex: Joey Logano (Team Penske), Brad Keselowski (Team Penske), Chase Elliott (Hendrick Motorsports), Kyle Larson (Hendrick Motorsports), Kevin Harvick (Stewart-Haas Racing), Christopher Bell (Joe Gibbs Racing), William Byron (Hendrick Motorsports) and Ryan Blaney (Team Penske).

NASCAR starting lineup at Atlanta

The starting lineup for Sunday's race at Atlanta was determined through a mathematical formula NASCAR adopted late in the 2020 season. The formula produced this starting lineup for Sunday's NASCAR race at Atlanta Motor Speedway, the Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500:

Starting pos. Driver Car No. Team
1 Denny Hamlin 11 Joe Gibbs Racing
2 Martin Truex Jr. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing
3 Joey Logano 22 Team Penske
4 Brad Keselowski 2 Team Penske
5 Chase Elliott 9 Hendrick Motorsports
6 Kyle Larson 5 Hendrick Motorsports
7 Kevin Harvick 4 Stewart-Haas Racing
8 Christopher Bell 20 Joe Gibbs Racing
9 William Byron 24 Hendrick Motorsports
10 Ryan Blaney 12 Team Penske
11 Kurt Busch 1 Chip Ganassi Racing
12 Ricky Stenhouse Jr. 47 JTG Daugherty Racing
13 Austin Dillon 3 Richard Childress Racing
14 Alex Bowman 48 Hendrick Motorsports
15 Bubba Wallace 23 23XI Racing
16 Aric Almirola 10 Stewart-Haas Racing
17 Chris Buescher 17 Roush Fenway Racing
18 Michael McDowell 34 Front Row Motorsports
19 Kyle Busch 18 Joe Gibbs Racing
20 Matt DiBenedetto 21 Wood Brothers Racing
21 Ross Chastain 42 Chip Ganassi Racing
22 Erik Jones 43 Richard Petty Motorsports
23 Ryan Preece 37 JTG Daugherty Racing
24 Chase Briscoe 14 Stewart-Haas Racing
25 Daniel Suarez 99 TrackHouse Racing Team
26 Justin Haley 77 Spire Motorsports
27 Cole Custer 41 Stewart-Haas Racing
28 Ryan Newman 6 Roush Fenway Racing
29 Tyler Reddick 8 Richard Childress Racing
30 Corey LaJoie 7 Spire Motorsports
31 BJ McLeod 78 Live Fast Motorsports
32 Anthony Alfredo 38 Front Row Motorsports
33 Cody Ware 51 Petty Ware Racing
34 James Davison 15 Rick Ware Racing
35 Quin Houff 00 StarCom Racing
36 Joey Gase 53 Rick Ware Racing
37 Josh Bilicki 52 Rick Ware Racing
38 Timmy Hill 66 Motorsports Business Management
39 Austin Cindric 33 Team Penske

Tom Gatto

Tom Gatto Photo

Tom Gatto joined The Sporting News as a senior editor in 2000 after 12 years at The Herald-News in Passaic, N.J., where he served in a variety of roles including sports editor, and a brief spell at APBNews.com in New York, where he worked as a syndication editor. He is a 1986 graduate of the University of South Carolina.