By Anthony Caruso III | Publisher
Ryan Blaney won the 1000Bulbs.com 500 on Monday at Talladega Superspeedway in Talladega, Alabama. Blaney completed the race in three hours and nearly 40 minutes.
Blaney was side-by-side with Newman as the two cars crossed the finish line. Blaney received the win, as he was out front by a nose.
This is Blaney’s third career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series win. This was his first win since the inaugural 2018 Bank of America Roval 400 at Charlotte Motor Speedway in Concord, North Carolina.
“It just means a ton,” Blaney said following the win. “I’ve been coming here ever since I was really young. Watching dad run here a lot, watching him run pretty good here a lot. Drive for the Wood Brothers here. Man, a cool feeling. This new infield, special to be in this new Victory Lane. I love coming here. Love it even more now.
“I can’t thank Aric at the end for helping me out. That big push that Newman and the 11 got, I knew I wasn’t going to be able to block it. They were coming so fast; they would have split me. I wanted to stay to the bottom. I kind of pulled the 11 off of the 6 there. Just had a big enough run to get to the 6. We kind of hit above the line, kind of pushed me below the line. That’s a big judgment call. You never know. I definitely wasn’t going to go below the line before we hit, made contact. I can’t say enough about this Dent Wizard team. Super fun the last couple days. Moving on, pretty cool.”
His first career win came in 2017 at the Axalta Presents the Pocono 400 at Pocono Raceway in Long Pond, Pennsylvania. The Dent Wizard sponsored driver for Roger Penske led 35 of the 188 laps.
Blaney also secured five playoff points with the win.
Wyndham Rewards sponsored driver Ryan Newman was the second-place finisher. FedEx Ground sponsored driver Denny Hamlin was the third-place finisher.
The 35 laps led by Blaney were the most. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. led 32 laps, while Brad Keselowski had 22 laps led.
Chase Elliott also led 19 laps led. Joey Logano and Kurt Busch each led 16 laps.
Clint Bowyer and William Byron also led 13 laps each, while Kyle Busch led seven laps. Newman and Aric Almirola also led three laps each. Jimmie Johnson led two laps, while several drivers, including Austin Dillon, Landon Cassill, Chris Buescher, Daniel Hemric, Bubba Wallace, Erik Jones, and Austin Theriault each led one lap.
This was a crash-filled race. In total, there were 14 drivers, who did not complete the event due to crashes.
15 drivers in all did not finish the event. Spencer Boyd, driving the Manscaped/Factor One Source ride for Rick Ware Racing, left on lap 53 due to engine problems.
Kyle Larson, driving the McDonald’s Spicy Chicken ride for Chip Ganassi Racing, was involved in a crash on lap 106. The crash on lap 106 also took out Ally driver Johnson and his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Alex Bowman.
Joey Gase, driving the Fan Memories at Richmond Raceway ride for Carl Long Motorsports, crashed on lap 161. One lap later, three cars left, including Jacob Companies sponsored driver Theriault, DeWalt sponsored driver Jones, and Axalta sponsored driver William Byron.
Daniel Suarez left in the Haas Automation ride on lap 168 due to a crash. Four drivers them left on lap 181 due to a crash, including One Bite sponsored driver Matt DiBenedetto, Envision sponsored driver David Ragan, Monster Energy driver Busch, and Beard Oil sponsored Brendan Gaughan.
Miller Lite sponsored driver Keselowski crashed on lap 182. Louisiana Hot Sauce driver Buescher crashed on lap 187.
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