LONG POND, Pa. — The Wood Brothers have long had a penchant for carrying drivers to their first-career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series victories, with five of the team’s last seven wins coming at the hands of first-timers.
Sunday afternoon, the sport’s most-tenured team added another name to that list, as 23-year-old Ryan Blaney etched his name into the history books by holding off Kevin Harvick in a thrilling finish at Pocono Raceway.
Blaney drove around Kyle Busch on fresher tires with 10 laps left, one circuit after Busch threw a massive block on him coming down the frontstretch, but the challenge wasn’t done there after Kevin Harvick also got around Busch and gave chase for the win.
But though Harvick dogged Blaney for the final six laps after running down the No. 21 Motorcraft/Quick Lane Tire & Auto Ford, Blaney never put a tire wrong, driving a perfect stint to knock down his first-career Cup victory.
The win was the Wood Brothers’ third at Pocono and first at the ‘Tricky Triangle’ since Neil Bonnett in 1980, as well as the venerable team’s 99th Cup win overall.
Sunday broke a 122-race winless drought for the team, stretching back six years, three months and 22 days to Feb. 20, 2011 — when Trevor Bayne won the Daytona 500 as a fresh-faced 20-year-old.
For Blaney, he joins team patriarch Glen Wood, Tiny Lund, Kyle Petty, Dale Jarrett, Elliott Sadler and Bayne as the seventh first-time Cup winner for the Wood Brothers, locking himself and the team into the playoffs as a result.
But the most poignant moment may have been as Blaney climbed out of his car to begin the victory lane celebration.
After serving as a pit reporter for Saturday’s NASCAR XFINITY Series ‘Drivers Only’ broadcast, where he interviewed Team Penske teammate Brad Keselowski in victory lane, Keselowski bolted to the winner’s circle fresh off a fifth-place finish to return the favor.
“It’s hard, man, to process this,” an emotional Blaney said. “I had to pass Kyle … and that was tough, because he was on older tires and struggling off Turn 1. Finally, we were able to get under him there, but then we had to hold Kevin off and he was fast all day.”
“I just didn’t want to make a mistake. That would have been the worst thing to do. I have to thank Kevin for racing me really clean; that was really cool of him. We got Motorcraft, Ford and Quick Lane back in victory lane. It’s the Wood Brothers 99th win, so that’s really special … that was just a lot of fun, man. This is really cool!”
After a day in which Busch dominated, leading more laps (100) in one race than he had in all of his prior Pocono starts combined, a crash by Kasey Kahne with 19 laps to go set up a myriad of pit stops and paved the way for a 13-lap dash to the checkered flag.
Busch, who pitted with 36 laps to go, stayed out on roughly 15-lap older tires than the rest of the front-runners but got the jump off the restart, pulling Blaney into second behind him from the outside lane.
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