Blaney makes progress but misses out on win
Two stage wins FORT WORTH were encouraging. Leading a race-high 148 laps was even more so.
Leaving Texas Motor Speedway with just a 12th-place finish left Ryan Blaney with things to reconcile, though, as the secondyear Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series driver continues to flirt with a first victory.
Blaney became the first driver to lead more than 100 laps for the Wood Brothers since Neil Bonnett at Rockingham in 1982, but a midrace play for points and a balky pit stop nullified his chances to maximize a fast No. 21 Ford. Blaney and the top seven stayed out under a late caution in the second stage to ensure his 10- point bonus, but he fell to 20th on his stop between the sessions. He slid through his box on a later stop on lap 299, incurring a penalty.
“Once we got that caution before the second segment, a lot of guys pitted and there was a lot of mixed strategies. And we decided to try to win the segment, which I thought was important to get those points and an extra bonus point,” Blaney said. “And I thought we had enough of the race to go to try to work our way back up through there, and I think we got to eighth or something like that before the last caution, and I slid through our pit box, and that was an unfortunate deal.”
Blaney said his team deserved much better.
“It’s not where you want to finish,” he said. “We deserved to finish third, at worst. Our car was, at its worst point was, a third-place car. You definitely think about that and are discouraged about that.
“But at the same time, you’ve got to look at the positives, and I think this is the most positive race we’ve ever had as a team, as a whole organization.”
Blaney, 23, who is contracted to Team Penske but is in his second campaign with the Wood Brothers, began the season with a second-place finish in the Daytona 500, has three top-10s in seven races and is sixth in the standings.
His stage wins were the first of his career and added 20 points to his haul from Texas.
“I feel like our past couple weeks, even though we haven’t gotten the great finishes we deserve, I felt like our cars have been really, really fast,” Blaney said. “I thought it said a lot about our team and car last week to run good at Martinsville (25th).”