Breakout winners among highlights for NASCAR fans

As the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series makes the turn for home, with 18 races complete and 18 to go, a look at some surprising story lines. New names in victory lane: Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Austin Dillon and Ryan Blaney. All are familiar to die-hard NASCAR fans, but they probably weren’t in the lexicon of new viewers.

For some, Stenhouse was better known as Danica Patrick’s boyfriend. In his fifth full-time season at Roush Fenway Racing, he changed that. His first career win came at Talladega Superspeedway in May and secured his first playoff slot. And his next-to-last-lap pass in an overtime finish at Daytona International Speedway this month proved his team has found its groove.

Dillon, who made headlines when he took the No. 3 made famous by seven-time champion Dale Earnhardt Sr. to the Daytona 500 pole as a rookie in 2014, also got his first win. He broke through in NASCAR’s longest test — May’s Coca-Cola 600.

Then, there’s Blaney. His Pocono Raceway win in June was the first for the Wood Brothers since Trevor Bayne won the 2011 Daytona 500. There has been chatter that Team Penske is looking to put Blaney in a third car. The Wood Brothers are considered a satellite team, and Blaney, in his third season with them, probably will be under the Penske umbrella sooner rather than later.

Blaney’s rising star: Blaney, 23, is a hit off the track, too. He has made headlines for his twominute recap of every Star Wars movie — not surprising, considering part of his Twitter bio reads “Aspiring Jedi” — and his backand-forth chatter with friend Dale Earnhardt Jr. Joe Gibbs Racing: This fourcar team makes the list, but for all

the wrong reasons. In 2016, JGR rang up 12 wins in 36 races and saw two drivers — Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards — advance to the championship race. A repeat of that feat would have been difficult, but everyone expected the team to have won a race by now. But Busch, Matt Kenseth, Denny Hamlin and rookie Daniel Suarez — who replaced retired Edwards — haven’t visited victory lane. Stage racing: The concept might have confused viewers at first and the TV interviews sometimes seem stilted, but the intensity of the racing has picked up as drivers vie for the points awarded to stage winners and those in the top 10. Martin Truex Jr. has proved a master, with 16 stage wins — including race victories at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Kansas Speedway and Kentucky Speedway. His 28 playoff points have him lapping the field, with seven-time series champ Jimmie Johnson next at 16.

Dale Earnhardt Jr.: NASCAR’s 14-time most popular driver was under scrutiny at the start of the season, as he returned after missing half of 2016 with concussions. He got married in the offseason, and there was speculation this year could be his last. But he seemed to put that notion to bed when he returned at Daytona, again detailing all the hard work and rehabilitation that went into getting him prepared. He told reporters before the Daytona 500: “There’s motivations to racing: the fans and camaraderie and all the great things you get to experience, but if I’m gonna come back, I have to be racing because I want to be out there.”

Two months later, he said he was stepping away from full-time driving after this season, sending Junior Nation into shock and landing another blow to a sport that has seen four-time champion Jeff Gordon and three-time titlist Tony Stewart leave since 2015. He has been competitive but lacks a win that would put him in the playoffs and give his fall retirement tour more juice.