Ryan Blaney has gained 100 points on the NASCAR Cup Series points lead over the last five races, putting him only 65 points back of leader Denny Hamlin with six races left in the regular season after Blaney’s victory at Atlanta.
Blaney has eight consecutive top-10 finishes that have made both the regular-season title and the No. 1 seed in the Chase become attainable over the second half of the summer stretch.
What’s working for Ryan Blaney?
“I think it’s lots of little things,” Blaney said Tuesday on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. “Our group’s done a really good job of managing the last couple months of kind of maximizing our day no matter what our day is looking like. If we have a 11th to 13th-place car in the beginning of the race, how do we get that better through the race?
“We’ve been able to do that where we’ve been able to run sixth to eighth at some of the tracks where we’ve been a little bit off. That’s a big testament to the whole 12 team and [crew chief] Jonathan Hassler. Our execution’s been really good. We haven’t really made a bunch of mistakes. We’re gaining on it, for sure.”
The next six races line up particularly well for Blaney and the No. 12 Team Penske group, which should have speed at North Wilkesboro, Iowa, Richmond, New Hampshire and Daytona as they try to chase down the points lead.