NASCAR CUP SERIES: QUAKER STATE 400 AVAILABLE AT WALMART

July 12, 2026

Ryan Blaney

Press Conference

An Interview with:

THE MODERATOR: We are now joined by the race winner tonight, Ryan Blaney. I'll open it up for questions.

Q. The opening stage, couple drivers compared it to the 550 package, second and third were more Gen 7 Atlanta. What was that perspective like behind the wheel?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, the first stage of the race was definitely kind of unlike something we've seen here before. Pretty warm outside, place is getting worn out. Strung out a lot. Guys were having their hands full back in the pack. They couldn't really stay with the lead pack.

Fortunately for us, Joey, Austin, we were able to get lined up, string it along, keep good pace to where it made it really hard for people to keep up.

The rain came. Cooled everything off. Track temp went down, air temp went down. Just got a lot more grip.

When we went back racing after the rain delay, the track had a ton more grip in it. More of a traditional healthy race, everyone packed up, cars driving a little bit better. That was the unique shift in the race, for sure.

Q. Going back to June 1st of last year, you're the only Ford driver who won in that stretch. What is it about the 12 team that has been able to be consistent over that year-plus stretch?

RYAN BLANEY: I have a great group around me. Jonathan Hassler is unbelievable. I'm really fortunate I get to work with him. Then everybody else on this 12 team, from engineers, mechanics, truck driver, pit crew, they do an amazing job. Their attitude is always incredibly high no matter how it's going. They always have confidence that they can show up at any racetrack and win.

It's just a neat group to be around. I'm fortunate that most of us have been together for many years honestly. I think Jonathan is the number one. It's fun to drive his race cars and work through things with him when we feel like we need to get better, where do we need to get better in these places.

Yeah, it's nice to get Ford wins and stuff. We want to get many more wins across every other driver, right? We'll continue to work at that.

Q. Tonight seemed kind of wide open at times. Guys were jockeying for position throughout. You were the constant. What separated you from everyone else?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, I mean, I couldn't ask for a better weekend. Sat on the pole, won both stages and won the race.

My car was incredibly fast, leading. I could defend moves without having to throw, like, low-percentage blocks. I just never really did that. Some moves are kind of unbeatable to defend as the leader. I would just let people get to my inside. If they passed me, great, I think I can probably develop a run to get them back.

It led great. Might not have been the best handling car out there. The thought the 23, the 45, the 20, those cars handled really good to where they could be super aggressive in making moves. Now, they weren't as fast leading the race. That was kind of a fun dynamic of my car is really fast, handles a little worse than theirs. Their car handles better but isn't quite as quick down the straightaway. Fun how all that played out.

I thought we were well-balanced with having speed and good-enough handling where I could manage where I needed to, take runs where I needed to, be able to clear guys, then go back to managing the lanes.

That's a big part of this, if you're the leader, how do you manage each lane. Do you want to try to keep them two-by-two behind you? If one guy is broke clear behind you, how do you want to handle that? If two or three broke clear behind you, that's hard to defend.

All that stuff is fun to work through. Our car was fast enough to be able to defend when we needed to and be aggressive when we needed to.

Q. You are 65 points out of the championship lead.

RYAN BLANEY: Really? Wow. Wow.

Q. There are not any more intermediate tracks. There's Indianapolis, but there's a bunch of tracks that probably negate the Toyota's advantage. Knowing that deficit, what's coming ahead, do you feel like you can make a run for this championship?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, maybe. Just keep doing what we're doing. We've done a great job of managing the summer here, trying to get better at the intermediate tracks, just making decent days out of them, where maybe we haven't been able to contend for a top four or five. We grind it out and scrounge out a top 10 out of it, just get our car better through the night.

I talked earlier what this group really does well, and that's it. When we don't have a car that maybe can contend for a win, maybe off a little bit, we continue to work on it and figure out how to get it better.

I don't think it's out of the question. We just have to keep doing what we're doing. That surprises me we're that close. I think before San Diego I was like 160 out. It shows you how quick things can kind of ebb and flow.

Got to keep doing what we're doing. Never know when we can get there or not.

Q. Having a good car aside, how much do you really even control your own destiny in those last two restarts? It seems like it's a matter of timing. How much can you really control in that scenario?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, it's situational what things you can control. I said earlier, some runs that guys get, you just can't defend. I've always had the mindset of just live another day type scenario of not wanting to throw a crazy block with a risk of crashing, like the last restart Bubba gave me a really good push. I got clear down the back. Honestly clear by too much. The top was coming with a head of steam, like four cars were hooked up. I kind of thought about blocking it. I felt like if I did, I was just going to get run over and probably turned.

I just tried to go to the higher percentage play of fake it and then settle in the bottom. Hopefully try to make another run in the next lap. You never know how these things are going to work out. We've seen races won here where the lanes are a certain way, not a green-white-checkered scenario, where the leader can kind of dictate and hop between lanes, keep 'em two-by-two.

Green-white-checkered scenarios, it's all what push do you get? I just got lucky that Christopher came to the rescue to me into three, when we were top of three there, was able to get me a push all the way three and four. I hope I can repay the favor to Christopher at some point because that was a big help in getting us to Victory Lane.

Yeah, some of it you can control. I feel like a lot of it, it's just the way the stars align.

Q. For you guys, the margin of error is a little bit tight than the Toyotas. I don't know if that's fair to say. 40-something points out to Tyler. Is that an even larger goal given the margin of error for your team?

RYAN BLANEY: I mean, I just like to start with as many points as we can. If we can get there, great. If not, I'm not going to be bummed about it because we cut in a good chunk and we've been having a really good year.

You're going to take as many points as you can get. If that's winning the regular-season championship and things like that. No, I don't really put too much thought into it. Just try to keep doing what we're doing. If we get there, that's awesome.

Q. Have you ever had a car this much stronger than the rest of the cars in a field?

RYAN BLANEY: Maybe not on this type of racetrack. There's been some unicorn cars I call them that I've been able to drive.

Martinsville '23, that was a unicorn. '24 was a unicorn. There's been a few.

Q. You think you'll stay up the rest of the night now?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, I don't know. What time is it, 3? Probably, my baby probably has shit in his diaper right now, crying. Maybe when I get home, he'll wake up. I won't get home till 6. He'll probably be waking up when I get home. Go home, rewatch the race, Charlie will be up.

Q. You talked about letting that line go in overtime. How do you develop that patience to be able to in a chaotic situation where you might not be able to get back to them, how do you develop that patience? Anything in particular that you think has calmed you down?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, I mean, I got to be around a lot of really good plate racers when I started. Brad, when I started, Keselowski was great. Got to learn from Joey. I watched a lot of these guys when I was either growing up or when I first started on the Cup side. Dale Jr. was another good one.

They all had one thing in common, they were really patient about how they would go about it. It's easy to get antsy in these situations. Things go quick.

Denny has talked about this a lot. Denny is one of the best plate racers. He's talking about living to fight another day, being patient with his moves. What is the higher percentage play for me in this position? I don't want to throw a block that I think has a high percentage chance of me getting crashed. Even if it's at the end of the race.

At that point down the backstretch we still had a lap and a half to go. I could be in worse spots. I don't want to take a chance of getting turned because I made kind of a foolish block when they were going 10 miles an hour faster than me.

Somebody is going to come on the body, going to get there. I hope it gets there good enough where we can still make a run at it.

It's years of racing and experience and things like that, learning from other people, has really kind of made me that way.

Q. Several drivers have talked about this being a roll-of-the-dice race. You were allowing cars to go past you knowing you could get them back. Some of the Toyotas pushed to the front. A lot of great strategy. Seems like the drivers were making as a field a lot of really smart decisions. Did you see that out there?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, I thought it was a fantastic race tonight. Like, seeing through the field, comers and goers, stuff like that.

Towards the end of the race, everyone is pushing harder. There were some cautions. I thought everyone did an awesome job. I'm excited honestly to go back and rewatch the race because I feel like it was a really good, good race.

So yeah, these things are tough. This race in particular is just wild. Daytona and Talladega have nothing on this race because it's just a different style of speedway racing.

Yeah, but I thought it was a great event. I thought it was a great showing. This place has put on good shows in the past. I think they just keep getting better and better as this place gets older and older. You're hanging on a lot more.

Q. As his racing style has been scrutinized a lot lately, can you describe the overtime restart with Carson Hocevar, how you passed for the win?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, the way that restart played out, honestly in late-race scenarios at this type of racetrack, to choose being the leader is sometimes a bummer. I hope I choose right. If I choose wrong and lose the lead, that is on me. That happened to me the restart before.

I mean, wherever he chose, I was obviously going to go front row. I had Bubba behind me on the bottom. You just hope you get a good push. So yeah, it was great to battle a lot of guys tonight. I raced the heck out of him, Bubba, Christopher, Tyler. We all had a great battle going on. Larson was up there for a while before he got turned around.

We had a great battle going for a lot of the race, swapping positions, but everyone being super smart. I thought we showed a lot of respect of those guys racing at the front tonight.

The run we got on him down the front played out right to where Bubba and I got hooked up on the bottom. They got bottom of three with Shane. I think the 20 and Bubba, both of us kind of broke clear. Carson was way out there. We had a massive run on him, kind of picked whatever lane was available. He kind of shaded bottom. I didn't want to kind of get jammed up on the bottom. I just tried to get to his right rear and was able to do that.

Yeah, those runs are massive. If you got two guys hooked up coming at you fast, they're hard to block. He did a good job not making a foolish block. He picked his lane and stayed there.

Yeah, it was fun racing a lot of those guys tonight.

Q. Did you have any indication of what happened with Bubba Wallace last and did it affect your car?

RYAN BLANEY: I don't know it affected my car. There was a lot of wall residue in the wheels. That caused the vibration. I had a big run down the front into one. He covered top. I got in a weird aero spot and got loose and hit the fence. Fortunately it didn't damage anything. That was hard racing and people trying to hold the lead.

Q. Two years ago the end of the race tonight reminded me of two years ago when it was you, Suarez and Kyle Busch. What did you learn that night that benefited you tonight?

RYAN BLANEY: Be on the top. Suarez won it from the top. I won it from the top (smiling). I don't know.

I don't know. There's a little different scenarios in that one. I was kind of leading the final handful of laps of that race in '24. Kind of maybe chose the wrong lane to be in. That scenario in '24 as well, both lanes were coming at me super quick. It's either make a dumb block and wreck the field or pick a lane and try to see what happens.

That scenario, we lost by six inches, but we were able to still finish really well.

Then tonight it was a little bit different. We kind of had to come from not the lead on the final restart to have a shot at it. The top seems to roll off of turn four. That was I guess the differences in that finish and this one.

Tonight's finish makes up a little bit for two years ago. I was still a little burnt over that finish a couple years ago. Nice to win here in this configuration because we've been close a lot.

Q. You mentioned Bell helping you played a big factor. From your perspective, how much did Bubba's move down the backstretch coming into the inside also help?

RYAN BLANEY: When he went bottom of three?

Q. He went below the line, then came back up.

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, I mean, I knew when Carson and I got side by side into one, through one and two, Bubba was free, single car. I'm like, He's obviously going to go bottom of three. He's going to try to win the race, which is the right move to make. I didn't know he went below the yellow line.

Q. They black flagged him.

RYAN BLANEY: That sucks. I thought he run second.

Yeah, so, I mean, he made the right move. Gave himself a shot to win. If he shows either one of us down the back, he has zero shot to win the race. Making the move that he did was his chance to win the race. It just worked out for me that kind of help came on the top.

Q. For Ford, 750th win, talk about how special it is to be a part of that?

RYAN BLANEY: Yes, it's really special to be just a small part of that. They've been incredibly great to me over my career. Gosh, been with them since 2013 when Penske made the switch from Dodge. They've been great people. Really been able to get to know a lot of folks over there, whether it was the racing program or Ford Motor Company. Jim Farley is a great leader. Mark Rushbrook is fantastic on the Ford Racing side.

It's been fun to have success with those folks. At the end of the day they're racers. That's what that company was built on. To be successful and to win for that and add to the success they've had in the Cup Series means a lot.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you. Congratulations.

RYAN BLANEY: Thank you.