NASCAR lineup at Richmond: Starting order, pole for Sunday’s race without qualifying

The starting lineup for Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Richmond Raceway was set by applying the statistical formula NASCAR is using for the majority of its 2021 races.

Drivers’ starting positions for the Toyota Owners 400 (3 p.m. ET; Fox, TSN, MRN, 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)

NASCAR is conducting qualifying and practice for just eight Cup Series races in the 2021 season. Six races in that group remain, starting with the May 23 event at Circuit of the Americas, a road course outside Austin, Texas.

Below is the starting lineup, which was set without qualifying, for Sunday’s NASCAR race on the 0.75-mile track at Richmond Raceway.

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Who won the pole for the NASCAR race at Richmond?

Martin Truex Jr. is the polesitter for Sunday’s race based on NASCAR’s mathematical formula. Truex won last weekend’s rain-delayed race at Martinsville Speedway, making him the only multiple-race winner in the Cup Series after eight races in 2021.

Denny Hamlin, Truex’s Joe Gibbs Racing teammate, will start second. Hamlin is the series points leader despite not having won yet this year. He has seven top-five finishes in eight races. Hamlin led more than half the 500 laps at Martinsville but his car faded late and Truex took the checkered flag. Hamlin finished third as Chase Elliott rallied for a second-place finish.

The rest of the top 10 for the race at Richmond: Elliott, William Byron, Joey Logano, Kyle Larson, Ryan Blaney, Christopher Bell, Kevin Harvick and Kyle Busch.

NASCAR starting lineup at Richmond

The starting lineup for Sunday’s race at Richmond Raceway was determined through a mathematical formula NASCAR adopted late in the 2020 season. The formula produced this starting lineup for the Toyota Owners 400 without qualifying:

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