DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- NASCAR wants young stars, and well, they’ve got two at the top of the Coke Zero Sugar 400 pole.

Chase Elliott wins his fourth career pole with a lap time of 46.381 seconds (194.045 mph). Alex Bowman will start second (46.621 sec, 193.046 mph).

Both drivers are 25 years old or younger and both took over for arguably NASCAR’s biggest stars -- Chase Elliott for Jeff Gordon and Alex Bowman for Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Elliott has won three career poles at Daytona, he’s hoping this time it adds up to his first career Monster Energy series win.

“You’re probably not going to lead the whole race. It would be nice if you can but at some point throughout the night things are going to happen, and there’s really nothing you can do about that,” Elliott said.

“You just kind of have to roll with it, pick and choose when you want to push and when you don’t and hopefully we’ll be able to keep our car rolling throughout the whole night on the ground at all times and out of the wall, and we’ll hopefully have a shot,” he added.

Chase Elliott is trying to keep his car in good shape. This week he had to worry about himself as well.  He sprained his right ankle “horsing around at the pool” on the Fourth of July.

He says he’s fine -- he’s clearly healthy enough to lay on the gas. 

Brad Keselowski, Jimmie Johnson, and Kevin Harvick round out the starting five for Saturday night’s race.  ​