FORT WORTH, TX. – Ryan Blaney’s 300th career Cup start comes during an era when Team Penske is not performing at its traditional best.
Blaney remains the Captain’s only shot at a NASCAR title after Joey Logano’s elimination from the Playoffs last weekend at Bristol Motor Speedway. Unfortunately, the 29-year-old competitor isn’t even the top Ford driver—or above the cutline—entering Texas Motor Speedway to start the Round of 12.
But Blaney is far from ready to concede.
“It is a shame the 22 (Logano) group got knocked out last week,” Blaney said. “Those guys just had an unfortunate situation happen and just barely missed it. I don’t think anyone thought that the defending champs were going to get knocked out early.
“I think you try to make it as positive as you can in our group and maybe we can try some stuff for next year or try some stuff for these tracks in the Round of 8 if we can get there. I think we do a good job of teamwork at the Penske shop with the crews and drivers working together and looking toward the future.
“You just try to make the best of situations and hopefully we have a plan to do that.”
The third-generation racer didn’t divulge the No. 12 team’s game plan for the Lone Star State. Whatever the brain trust at Team Penske devised for Blaney’s success this weekend wasn’t evident during the AutoTrader EchoPark Automotive 400 time trials on Saturday. Blaney qualified 23rd—seventh among the Fords. His teammate Logano was just three spots better.
Consistency has been missing in the Penske camp. Between Blaney and Logano, the pair have delivered just two wins this season. Logano won five races into the season at the first Atlanta race in March. Blaney captured his sole victory in the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte in May.
That was 15 races ago, and Blaney hasn’t posted a top-five since.
“I feel like in the beginning of the year with the new nose we had at the Ford camp, it took everyone a while to kind of get used to it and figure out what we needed to do to optimize our aero balance,” Blaney said. “We had a good handle on it, and we hit it in May at Charlotte, and then RFK (Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing) found the speed they did towards the end of the regular season, and that was really impressive. It shows me that it’s out there. You can find it. It’s just a matter of getting everything perfect to be able to compete.
“I feel like our window of success is smaller than others as far as Chevy and Toyota. I feel like they have a bigger box of going into a weekend, and maybe they are a little bit off, but they are still competitive enough to run top-five and still work on it.
“Our window has been a little smaller this year to where we have to be a little more perfect than everybody else to be able to compete. We can do it. It’s there. You can definitely make it happen. It was a really good job by our group in the first round to not have any huge mistakes to take us out and being resilient. That goes a long way.”
Given the strength of the remaining 12 drivers vying for the title, not only will the No. 12 team need to be mistake-free, but they will have to post better numbers than they did in the Round of 16.
The good news for Blaney? He has won at all three tracks in this round. Talladega Superspeedway is the only venue where Blaney has multiple career wins—and he finished second in his last two starts at the 2.66-mile superspeedway. Blaney won the inaugural Roval race at Charlotte Motor Speedway in 2018. He has completed every Cup lap raced at the 2.28-mile road course, which ranks third for Blaney for best average finish at a track.
While Blaney hasn’t won a points race at Texas, he was victorious in last year’s All-Star Race on the 1.5-miler in Fort Worth, where he led 84 of 140 laps. In his last 10 starts at TMS, Blaney has posted four top fives and eight top 10s.
“You never know how this race plays out,” Blaney said. “It’s a different mileage than years past. We have 400 miles here this weekend and you saw it last year a lot and in the past with a lot of different pit strategies, especially if you get that odd caution like 20 or 15 laps before the end of a stage. There are a lot of teams that are out of the playoffs that will flip it to get track position, and that puts teams that are in the spot to get stage points that are in the playoffs in a tough spot.
“What do you chase? Do you chase points and try to rally back or chase a win and try to flip it? I think it depends on who you are racing and you try to judge. It is also what speed you have in your car, and if you think you have a car that has the speed to win, if so, you definitely flip and try to play for that. I think it depends on how cautions fall.
“You can have all the plans in place, but they get thrown out the window really quickly and I feel like teams are really good at improvising and making calls on the fly. You just hope you hit it right.”
Follow Lee Spencer on Twitter @CandiceSpencer or email her at: [email protected].
