Michael McDowell paces NASCAR Cup Series practice at COTA

Michael McDowell was the fastest man in the Lone Star State early Saturday morning. 

The 2021 Daytona 500 champion was the fastest in Saturday's NASCAR Cup Series practice session at Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas. McDowell's second and most recent Cup Series win came at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course in 2023.

Notable practice results

Ryan Blaney, Connor Zilisch, Kyle Larson and Todd Gilliland rounded out the top five, with Kyle Busch, Alex Bowman, Daniel Suarez, Cole Custer and Carson Hocevar completing the top 10.

 Other notable results include AJ Allmendinger in 12th, Chase Elliott in 13th, William Byron in 16th, Ross Chastain in 21st and Bubba Wallace in 23rd. 

Cup Series points leader Tyler Reddick was 19th-fastest, while defending COTA winner Christopher Bell was 27th. 

Road course ace Shane van Gisbergen was 20th on the speed chart, while Cody Ware was last (37th), running a lap 2.448 seconds off the pace of McDowell. 

Qualifying is next on Prime Video. The DuraMax Texas Grand Prix presented by RelaDyne will go green shortly after 3:30 p.m. ET Sunday, with coverage on Fox, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. Pre-race coverage will begin at 2:30 p.m. ET on FOX and PRN.