Thankfully, Ryan Blaney was able to walk away from a vicious crash on a restart at Lap 147 of Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series Ally 400 at Nashville Superspeedway.
On the restart, Brad Keselowski, who was restarting from the fourth position and was lined up in the outside lane, got off to a slow start, which caused the field behind him to stack up.
Keselowski received a shot from William Byron, which sent Keselowski down into Austin Cindric’s No. 2 Ford Mustang. This then bottled the entire inside line up, and as the accordion reached Ryan Blaney, Kyle Busch made contact with the rear of the No. 12 Ford Mustang to send Blaney skidding through the infield grass.
As Blaney reached the end of the grass, the 12 car darted hard left into a concrete barrier on the inside of the track, causing insane damage to the nearly bulletproof Next Gen car. Here is a video of the hard crash:
This was a very hard impact, glad Blaney was able to walk away from this one. #NASCAR pic.twitter.com/rOC8uUuSz9
— Toby Christie (@Toby_Christie) June 26, 2023
Obviously, the damage put an end to Blaney’s race. After climbing from the car, Blaney went to the ground for a moment, before climbing back to his feet, removing his helmet and taking the trip to the infield care center.
After being evaluated and released from the infield care center, Blaney was critical of the fact that there was no SAFER barrier installed in front of that wall.
“I don’t know why there’s no SAFER barrier there, that’s pretty ridiculous, honestly,” Blaney seethed. “Hardest hit I’ve ever had in my life. Happy to be alright. Just sucks for the Pennzoil Ford Mustang, and stinks to go home early.”
