DARLINGTON (AP) -- Jamie McMurray set a track record at Darlington Raceway to lead qualifying for the Southern 500 on Friday.
McMurray made it around the 1.366-mile egg-shaped superspeedway at 180.370 mph to surpass Matt Kenseth's record run from a year ago.
Jeff Gordon was second fastest and Brian Vickers was third for Saturday night's Sprint Cup event.
McMurray came out relatively unblemished on a day when racers spun out and hit the walls in practice and qualifying. Dale Earnhardt Jr. needed a backup car after wrecking on the second lap of practice.
Kyle Busch, the winner at Richmond last week, tagged the wall during his qualifying run, drawing cheers from fans in the stands at Darlington.
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