Ryan Blaney Tag

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service LOUDON, N.H. – The drought is over. Blanked for 21 straight races, Kevin Harvick was winless in 2019 until he held off Denny Hamlin on older tires to win Sunday’s Foxwoods Resort Casino 301 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. The victory was Harvick’s fourth at the Magic Mile, most among active drivers and tied with Jeff Burton for most all-time. The driver of the No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford Mustang won his second-straight race at the one-mile flat track and his third in theRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service LOUDON, N.H. – Starved for a pole position for nearly two years, Brad Keselowski put a decisive end to the qualifying drought on Friday at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, edging Kyle Busch for the top starting spot in Sunday’s Foxwoods Resort Casino 301 (3 p.m. ET on NBCSN, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). Fastest on the first of his two laps in time trials, Keselowski beat Busch by .015 seconds, covering the one-mile distance in 27.927 seconds (136.384 mph). Busch clocked in at 136.311Read More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor The 2019 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season is officially at the halfway point, crossing the threshold last weekend in Daytona. To kick off the second half of the season, the series heads to the Bluegrass State for Saturday night’s running of the Quaker State 400 at Kentucky Speedway. Kentucky first joined the Cup Series schedule in 2011 and has played host ever since, with just four different drivers claiming victory in the eight races held at the track so far. The track was knownRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – With 42 laps remaining in Sunday’s Coke Zero Sugar 400 at Daytona International Speedway, dark clouds closed in on the 2.5-mile superspeedway and as it always happens when weather threatens, the intensity ratcheted up and the inevitable “Big One” struck. Austin Dillon and Clint Bowyer had hooked up in the draft to find their way to the front of the field when Bowyer ducked low from second place to try and take the lead for himself. Dillon threw an untimely blockRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – A lightning delay at Daytona International Speedway forced cancellation of qualifying for Saturday’s Coke Zero Sugar 400 (7:30 p.m. ET on NBC, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) because it prevented timely completion of Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series inspection before time trials. Accordingly, with the field ordered according to owner points, Joey Logano will start from the pole position in the No. 22 Team Penske Ford. Kyle Busch, who thought he would have qualified mid-pack if time trials had beenRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Following last Sunday’s battle in the Windy City, the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series heads back to where it all began, Daytona International Speedway, for this weekend’s 60th running of the Coke Zero Sugar 400, the third superspeedway race of the season. From 1959 until 1987, the 160 lap, 400 mile shootout at the World Center of Racing, then called the Firecracker 400, was held on July 4th, even if the holiday fell in the middle of the week. Beginning inRead More

By Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service JOLIET, Ill.  – Alex Bowman’s first career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup victory at Chicagoland Speedway was as much a lesson in perseverance, determination and guts as it was a show of his raw talent. It took it all those qualities for the 26-year-old to reach Victory Lane for the first time in Sunday’s Camping World 400. Bowman’s No.88 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet held off a hard-charging Kyle Larson for the win by .546-seconds – the two young drivers door-to-door in the closing laps, exchanging theRead More

By Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service JOLIET, Ill. – Austin Dillon earned his third Busch Pole Award of the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season Saturday evening at Chicagoland Speedway, his No. 3 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet posting a speed of 176.263 mph around the 1.5-mile track. Kevin Harvick will start second, his fifth front row start of the season in the No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford. Sunoco Rookie of the Year candidate, Dillon’s RCR teammate Daniel Hemric was third fastest, seven-time Cup champion Jimmie Johnson was fourth and KurtRead More

By Luis Torres, Staff Writer SONOMA, California — Hungry for his second Toyota/Save Mart 350 victory, Kyle Busch was a man on a mission to beat Martin Truex, Jr., but the bid fell 1.861 seconds short Sunday at Sonoma Raceway. With fresher tires, Busch’s caved-in No. 18 M&Ms Hazelnut Toyota Camry kept cutting down his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate’s 8.3 second lead with 20 laps remaining. Several laps later, Busch’s deficit just kept decreasing and the question would now become can he pass Truex? Lapped traffic would also play a pivotalRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service SONOMA, Calif. – Dominant in defense of last year’s victory in the Toyota/Save Mart 350, Martin Truex Jr. held off Kyle Busch, his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate, to win Sunday’s Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series event at Sonoma Raceway. With three-lap fresher tires after the final set of green-flag pit stops at the 2.52-mile road course—which for the first time since 1997 featured use of the carousel connecting Turns 4 and 7—Busch closed an 8.269-second gap to slightly more than a second over theRead More