In Sunday’s Daytona 500, Ryan Blaney was (somehow) able to bring his No. 12 Menards Ford Mustang home in eighth place, despite the vehicle looking like it had been tossed through a woodchipper.
Here is Ryan @Blaney talking about somehow salvaging an eighth place finish with a destroyed race car. And when asked if this is something he just does now, as he’s done it before, he says, “Hell no. I don’t want to start doing it.” #NASCAR #Daytona500 https://t.co/uJkSnsF6In pic.twitter.com/L8jvc0OKAS
— Toby Christie (@Toby_Christie) February 20, 2023
The 29-year-old’s damage came as a result of being involved in three different incidents throughout Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series season-opener at Daytona – two during the 500-mile contest, and one during the race’s cooldown lap.
After getting a significant piece of a multi-car accident on the final lap of the race, Blaney was making his cooldown lap around the 2.5-mile superspeedway, when he ran into some trouble, spinning his No. 12 and lightly tapping the outside wall.
Looking at Blaney’s onboard camera, it appears as though the Team Penske driver was attempting to make an evasive maneuver, in order to avoid running into the back of AJ Allmendinger, who was dramatically slowing in front of him.
A replay of Blaney’s on-board camera during the final NASCAR Overtime restart, as well as the cooldown lap – where you can see the incident happen – was posted to YouTube by NASCAR Fan99.
