Castroneves ends long pole drought

Helio Castroneves’ drought is over.

The man who has grabbed more poles than any other driver in IndyCar Series history hadn’t captured one in qualifying since winning “Dancing with the Stars” last fall. But Castroneves pushed Danica Patrick aside Friday by averaging 204.519 mph over four laps in qualifying for the Firestone Indy 200 at the Nashville Superspeedway in Gladeville, Tenn.

He did start on the pole in Japan with positions set by points.

But this pole meant much more to Castroneves, who extended a couple of records. His series record of poles is 24 for his career with at least one in seven consecutive seasons.

NASCAR

Although there will be floodlights all around the track, NASCAR teams still are much in the dark going into the first Sprint Cup series night race at Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Ill.

After seven years of racing at the 1.5-mile track on the outskirts of suburban Chicago during the daytime, the race was moved to Saturday night this year.

But NASCAR threw its teams a curveball by not scheduling any night practices at the track in the two days leading up to tonight’s race. Thursday’s qualifying session was rained out, meaning the first time many drivers will see the track under the lights will be when they take the green flag.

Add in NASCAR’s new Car of Tomorrow, which is being used at Chicagoland for the first time after it appeared only in selected races last season, and Sprint Cup series champion Jimmie Johnson said teams are doing a “large degree” of speculating on how to properly adjust their cars to make them handle properly.

Nationwide Series

Kyle Busch added another victory to his column, winning the Dollar General 300 at the Chicagoland Speedway.

Busch took the lead on the 95th lap in his No. 18 Toyota, held it until a pit stop on the 149th and then regained it five laps later for the remainder of the 200-lap race on the 1.5-mile track.