Derek Thorn captures third straight Winter Showdown Pole

In three years of the Winter Showdown, two things have become standard:

Derek Thorn is going to win the pole and Bubba Pollard is going to win the race. The first trend continued on Saturday in qualifying for the Kern County showcase but Thorn and a full-field of Super Late Model drivers hope to break the latter.

Thorn posted the quickest speed in single-car time trials with a fast time of 17.571 seconds around the California half-mile. Dustin Ash was second quick over Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series rookie Erik Jones, Jeremy Doss and Buddy Shepherd.

NASCAR champion Kyle Busch qualified sixth while Pollard posted the eighth best time.

Thorn, the 2013 NASCAR K&N Pro Series West champion, didn’t even think he had the short-run speed needed to compete for a third-straight pole.

“It’s an honor,” Thorn said on the Speed51 Pay Per View broadcast. “It was an honor last year and definitely an honor this year. If you would have asked me if we were going to be here an hour ago, I would have swore that we weren’t. We didn’t have the fire-off speed. I didn’t think our short-run stuff was that good. We’re better on longer runs.

“So to end up at the front of a field this good says a lot for everyone at Campbell Motorsports and we’re excited for tonight.”

The top-30 from time trials are guaranteed entry into the 250-lap main event while the final six spots will be decided based on a last chance race and track-based provisional.

The complete results from qualifying can be found below.