NEWTON, Iowa — Recap by Race Chaser Online Managing Editor Jacob Seelman — Brian Lawdermilk/NASCAR via Getty Images photo —
Ryan Blaney pulled off a pretty good imitation of his Team Penske stablemate Joey Logano on Saturday night at Iowa Speedway.
Blaney hung on through two green-white-checkered attempts, running away from first Brendan Gaughan and then Regan Smith over the final stretch en route to the victory in the U.S. Cellular 250.
The 21-year-old led 252 of the 260 laps en route to the win, more than double the number of laps he had ever led in a single race coming into the night, after watching Logano lead all 300 laps at Bristol back in March.
The only laps that Blaney didn’t lead were laps 147-150, when Regan Smith beat the No. 22 off pit road and led for four laps under yellow, and laps 205-208, when Ryan Sieg stayed on the race track to lead a lap during pit stops and then Chase Elliott took two tires to try and steal track position for the stretch run to the finish.
None of those ploys were any match for the sheer speed of the Discount Tire Ford, however, which bolted to the lead on every restart all night long and was never seriously challenged en route to its fifth XFINITY win of the year — Blaney’s third career series win and first since Bristol last August.
“Finally!” Blaney exclaimed in victory lane. “That was tough. I won a Truck race here [in 2012] all on restarts, and I didn’t know if it was going to play out like we needed it to. I can’t thank everyone on this Discount Tire team enough. It’s great to get the car in victory lane; it was unbelievable this entire race.”
“It doesn’t make up for [losing Indianapolis], but it sure helps [me] forget about it.”
Brendan Gaughan was running second through the first green-white-checkered attempt, nearly using Blaney up on a restart with five laps to go in regulation when he squeezed him up almost into the wall, but could not complete the pass. During the first overtime run, Gaughan got loose battling for the lead with Blaney into turn one, all but spinning in front of the field and falling back to seventh as Brennan Poole checked up and spun behind him to set up the second green-white-checkered run.
Gaughan’s spin also left Blaney nervous until the checkered flag flew — with the young superstar seeing and smelling smoke from a left rear tire rub in his cockpit all the way to the end.
“I knew we had that left rear rub at the end there — it was smoking inside the car a lot — but I was nervous,” Blaney admitted. “I don’t know if it bent something or what, but it didn’t handle good the last two laps. Luckily though, the car was good and it let us hang on for the end.”
Smith tied JR Motorsports’ best run by their championship-eligible drivers this season and notched his season-best finish after sneaking through the chaos of Gaughan’s spin to restart second alongside Blaney for the final restart — a position he held to the finish.
“I thought we were a second place car most of the night,” Smith admitted, “but on that last restart I finally thought we might have a chance at him. The 22 was fast, but that last restart he had some damage on the left rear. His guys asked how bad it was, and of course I’m going to tell them it’s damaged and they need to pit because I wanted to win the race!”
“He did a nice job though, Ryan did. It looked like his car got tight, but I just didn’t have enough to get up to the fender there and bog him down and get a run on him. We’ve been working really hard this year and haven’t necessarily gotten the results [to show for it], but tonight was a step forward heading to three weeks of road racing.”
Richard Childress Racing rounded out the balance of the top five, with Brian Scott, Ty Dillon and Gaughan finishing in positions three through five.
Gaughan’s rally back to fifth was one of the impressive moves of the final dash, but the NXS veteran was disappointed after “giving his all” on the two prior restarts and not having a win to show for it.
“That last restart, I went for it,” Gaughan said. “I got to the throttle, started to get loose and [Blaney] did what he was supposed to do. We got into each other and I didn’t want to wreck him — you never want to wreck people for that crap — but we both saved it and after I saw the smoke [from Blaney’s car I said to myself, ‘I don’t want him to get a flat and that ruin his night.'”
“Dang, we were so good all night long, though. I gave my two best restarts and almost had him twice [laughs].”
Polesitter Daniel Suarez came home sixth, followed by Erik Jones, who rallied from the back of the pack after flying in from Pocono late in the day and having no laps in his car prior to the green flag. Elliott Sadler, defending champion Elliott and Ross Chastain rounded out the top 10.
The race was slowed by just three cautions prior to lap 210 — one for debris at lap 76 after the longest green-flag run in history to start an Iowa XFINITY race, the second at lap 144 after Michael Self cut down a tire and the third at lap 203 when Dylan Lupton spun out in turn three.
After that, however, chaos began to reign under the full moon.
Kenny Wallace, making his final NASCAR start in the Joe Gibbs Racing No. 20, spun on lap 210 after contact with Cale Conley to bring out the fourth caution of the night; a crash on the frontstretch after Elliott and Brandon Jones got together racing for seventh drew the fifth yellow and set up a restart with 14 laps to go.
That dash back to the green flag would ultimately see Ben Rhodes spin with 10 laps remaining and a second spin by Kenny Wallace with three laps to go the dramatic green-white-checkered attempts that followed.
Wallace dug deep and battled back to 15th, but it was a disappointing end to a day that held so much promise for the veteran.
Leaving Iowa, Chris Buescher holds a 20 point lead over Elliott in the hunt for the season-long championship.
The NASCAR XFINITY Series returns to action on Saturday, August 8 for the Nationwide Children’s Hospital 200 from the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course.
RESULTS: NASCAR XFINITY Series; U.S. Cellular 250; Iowa Speedway; August 1, 2015
- Ryan Blaney
- Regan Smith
- Brian Scott
- Ty Dillon
- Brendan Gaughan
- Daniel Suarez
- Erik Jones
- Elliott Sadler
- Chase Elliott
- Ross Chastain
- Darrell Wallace Jr.
- Ryan Sieg
- Chris Buescher
- Brennan Poole
- Kenny Wallace
- Dakoda Armstrong
- Dylan Lupton
- J.J. Yeley
- Ryan Reed
- Brandon Jones
- Jeremy Clements
- David Starr
- Cale Conley
- Blake Koch
- Matt Wallace
- Eric McClure
- Johanna Long
- Anthony Kumpen
- Mike Harmon
- Ben Rhodes
- Matt Frahm
- Michael Self
- Jimmy Weller
- Joey Gase
- Harrison Rhodes
- John Jackson
- Morgan Shepherd
- Zachary Bruenger
- Josh Reaume
- Jeff Green
About the Writer
Jacob Seelman is the Managing Editor of Race Chaser Online and creator of the Motorsports Madness radio show, airing at 7 p.m. Eastern every Monday on the Performance Motorsports Network. Seelman grew up in the sport, watching his grandparents co-own the RaDiUs Motorsports NASCAR Cup Series team in the 1990s. He is currently studying Broadcast Journalism at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, S.C., and is also serving as the full-time tour announcer for both the United Sprint Car Series and the Must See Racing Sprint Car Series.
Email Jacob at: speed77radio@gmail.com
Follow on Twitter: @Speed77Radio or @JacobSeelman77
