Ryan Blaney Tag

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service CONCORD, N.C. – In a race that was as wild as advertised in the closing laps, Ryan Blaney sped past crashing Jimmie Johnson and Martin Truex Jr. in the final corner to win Sunday’s inaugural Bank of America ROVAL 400 at the Charlotte Motor Speedway Road Course. With his first Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series victory of the season and the second of his career, Blaney advanced to Round of 12 in the Playoffs. Johnson wasn’t as lucky. The seven-time series champion was pressuring TruexRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor CONCORD, N.C. – Final practice seemed to be going exactly as planned for 2012 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series champion Brad Keselowski, but things went awry for him just minutes after blazing around Charlotte Motor Speedway with the fastest lap of the session. Keselowski toured around the Charlotte road course with a lap of 1 minute, 17.730 seconds at 105.596 mph, but as the session neared its final moments, the frontstretch chicane became the bane of his existence. The lap looked to be going just fineRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor CONCORD, N.C. – Day two at the new Charlotte Motor Speedway Road Course has been just as eventful as the first, with Jimmie Johnson putting up the fastest time on the board, while others found themselves ensnared by the 17-turn, 2.28-mile layout. Daniel Hemric led the way for the majority of the session before Johnson took over the No. 1 spot with a lap of 1 minute, 18.043 seconds at 105.173 mph. Hemric finished the session in second place, followed by Martin Truex, Jr., Brad Keselowski,Read More

By Seth Eggert, Staff Writer CONCORD, N.C. – In qualifying for the Bank of America ROVAL 400, Ryan Blaney avoided the trouble that some of his Playoff Grid rivals encountered. His Team Penske teammate, Brad Keselowski was not as lucky, breaking the power-steering pump after hitting one of the blue ‘turtle’ curbs at the Charlotte Motor Speedway Road Course. Compared to the first round of qualifying, the second round was tame. Blaney ended up ninth on the starting grid, running a 105.919 mph, 1:17.493 second lap. He was the seventh-fastestRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor There are numerous adjectives that can be used to describe this weekend’s race on the new Charlotte Motor Speedway road course: unpredictable, volatile, treacherous, chaotic, etc. Once thing is for sure as the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series ventures into the unknown, it’s going to be a hell of a ride. In an effort to spice things up this season, Charlotte officials elected to switch from running another race on the 1.5-mile oval to creating what they are calling the ROVAL, incorporating both the high banksRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor Following a wild opening race for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs in Las Vegas, the championship contenders head back to the East Coast this weekend to take on Richmond Raceway in their inaugural playoff date. Often described as the perfectly designed racetrack by drivers, the 0.75-mile track lends itself to not only short track characteristics of beating and banging, but also the characteristics of a larger track with the side-by-side racing that will take place throughout the event. Saturday night’s Federated Auto Parts 400,Read More

By Seth Eggert, Staff Writer Team Penske’s Ryan Blaney was among those starting the 2018 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs strong. The third-year driver avoided the misfortunes of most Playoff Grid drivers to finish fifth in the South Point 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Over the course of the final restarts, Blaney’s No. 12 PPG Ford Fusion was in tow with his Team Penske teammates. In the chaotic scramble in overtime he battled three-wide with Kyle Larson and defending champion Martin Truex, Jr. While Larson and Truex chasedRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service LAS VEGAS – In a war of attrition that caused a multitude of problems for the majority of Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Playoff contenders, Brad Keselowski emerged unscathed with his third straight victory in the series and the 500th triumph for Team Penske in all forms of racing combined. Sunday’s South Point 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, the Playoff opener for NASCAR’s foremost series, went to overtime, lasting five laps longer than the scheduled 267. But Keselowski held the top spot through threeRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor Viva Las Vegas…again? Yes, ladies and gentlemen, for the first time in the track’s history, Las Vegas Motor Speedway will be hosting a second Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race this season as they kick off the 10-race Playoff stretch with Sunday’s running of the South Point 400. Las Vegas began its life on the NASCAR circuit as a 1.5-mile oval with 12 degrees of banking in 1998, but following the 2006 running of the race, the track underwent a massive reconfiguration that saw progressive bankingRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor Now that the checkered flag has flown following Monday’s rain-delayed Big Machine Vodka 400 at the Brickyard, the regular season for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series is complete and the 16-driver field for the playoffs is set. Starting next week in Las Vegas, the playoff contenders will begin a 10-week grind toward crowning a champion at the season finale at Homestead-Miami, but how do they really stack up against each other? Kevin Harvick (2050 Points) – Harvick and Kyle Busch can be ranked as 1A andRead More