NASCAR CUP SERIES: CHAMPIONSHIP RACE

November 8, 2026

Ryan Blaney

Press Conference

An Interview with:

THE MODERATOR: We are now joined by our race-winning driver, Ryan Blaney.

Questions for Ryan.

Q. This was a pretty similar scenario to a couple years ago. Does that make this win any sweeter? What did you feel like you learned from the last time you raced Tyler for the win here?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, I tell you, last two years I've had nightmares about that finish (smiling). It's nice to get a little redemption from that.

It's fun to race Tyler. He and I race with a lot of respect. It's always fun to go up against guys like that.

Yeah, what I learned? I mean, the situation was a little bit similar or different where I was kind of the pursuer and he was leading. Sometimes it's kind of backwards to say, but sometimes being the pursuer is almost a little bit easier than the leader.

There's the leader, trying to pick what lane is going to be the best. If you choose wrong, you can really hurt yourself. That's what happened to me a couple years ago. I chose wrong on lanes. I bet if you ask him, he probably would have made a different decision, too, the lap prior.

It's fun battles like that. I think we're even now. That makes me feel a little bit better than I did a couple years ago.

Q. Two straight years ending the season with a win. How does that impact you going into the off-season?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, definitely went out on a high note. We weren't racing for a championship this weekend, so it's just, okay, what are your goals? The goal is to try to win the race. There were some points positions we could make up. We were able to do that tonight, which is great for our group.

Yeah, you just want to end on a high note. If you're not running for a championship, you want to win the last race. Unfortunately not racing for a championship, but it's good momentum for the winner. It's nice to celebrate with those guys one last time.

They did a great job. The Chase that we had just wasn't good enough. Had too many blemishes. Other than that, I'm really proud how we ran the last 10 weeks. We just didn't have the finishes that we needed to kind of contend.

They should be proud of themselves. It's nice to drive for a great team. Even though we weren't in the championship race this weekend, they put their head down and really went to work and gave as much effort as if we were racing for a championship.

Q. Passing was at a premium amongst the leaders today. You looked like you shot out of a cannon going around Reddick. What did you have in your car that you might not have had before?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, I mean, I look back at the restart to start stage three, I was really fast. I went from fifth to 2nd. Was kind of dogging the 11 for a while. Couldn't get around him. We all kind of spread out a little bit. Then we lost the lead when the 11 got the fence. I had to check, Reddick got us both.

I knew my car was good on restarts on short runs. Thought it was strong on the long runs, too. Fired off good and picked the correct lanes to kind of keep momentum up. Just kind of picked guys off one at a time. I think I went to fourth or fifth on the restart. Kind of able to get by guys one at a time. This car worked really well. No matter what lane I went in, I thought it ran multiple lanes pretty good, which is hard to come by.

Q. It said a lot that Homestead is a track that demands a lot from the driver. What skills do you find this track calls on the most?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, it's definitely a unique place.

I don't know. I mean, I feel like obviously you have the guys who run the wall really good. Running the wall efficiently is a lot different than just running the fence. Everyone can run the wall, but can you do it efficiently with speed lap after lap. Some guys can do that really, really well. I wouldn't say I'm the best at it. I'd say I'm decent at doing that.

Where I've always tried to work on my car here is how can I run off the wall. If everyone is running the fence, how are you going to pass anybody. We put a big emphasis on trying to run off the wall through practice and through the race and, hey, what do I need to change to figure that out.

Yeah, just a good feel in the race car, confidence to run the wall, but also being versatile and wanting to move around. I've always tried to be really open to that here. I don't ever want to be married to the wall. I want to be able to move around. I think that kind of benefited us tonight.

Q. Can you take us through the last two laps as you came up on Tyler.

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, I mean, to be honest with you, I can probably only talk you through the last lap and a half from my memory.

I know I got a good run off of two, coming to the white down the backstretch. He protected the bottom. We were both kind of -- I was like, I'm going to get there. He was like, No, you're not.

And I finally kind of got there. I'm going to try to get to his right rear. I kind of was able to get there at a moment of entering the corner to where I was outside and kind of in the position I wanted to be in.

I felt good about if I got to the bottom of him, I felt good about running the bottom. If I got to the outside of him, I felt better about being able to pull off the pass than if I was on the bottom.

Yeah, he protected so much, I was able to kind of pop back to the right, get into three hard. The last lap, just not trying to do what I did two years ago, led him to my right side. Smart enough not to make that same mistake twice.

Pretty exciting, honestly. I'm excited do watch the last restart because I kind of have foggy brain currently. It was definitely a hell of a way to end it.

Q. Jumped three points in the standings. Does that mean anything?

RYAN BLANEY: Huge, massive. I think definitely being top five is fantastic. So yeah, it makes everyone feel good for the team. It's financially beneficial to finish as high as you can. That part was our goal.

That was a tall order, fourth, coming into this weekend. I felt like we could maybe get to fifth. But with the 19 having problems, that opened that door up if we had a monster day. Fortunately we were able to.

Q. When the caution came out, did you think you had a shot?

RYAN BLANEY: I mean, honestly, I felt like I had a really good shot before the yellow 'cause we ran long and were just mowing those guys down, especially the 45 and the 11. The 24 was a little ways ahead of that group. I felt like my car was good enough I would maybe have got there from running long. I thought that was a good call.

I was kind of either way. I felt good about getting there before the yellow, then after the yellow I knew my car restarted really well, so I felt decent about it. You never know how these things are going to go. You just do the best job you can.

Q. I asked Jonathan for his perspective, but curious how have you evolved as a driver since working with him?

RYAN BLANEY: I've loved working with Jonathan since '22. It's been a lot of fun to have success together. He and I's personalities are really similar. Just kind of laid back.

I feel like we do a great job, and we've communicated, just understanding how can both of us be the most efficient that we can in how we prepare, how we communicate through the weekend, through the race.

Just personalities mesh. He's an easy guy to kind of talk to about things and just open-minded. I feel like he and I are very open-minded people. I feel like that's very important to be in this sport.

But yeah, just one of the best crew chiefs in the garage. I will stand by that. It's been a pleasure to work with him. He builds some really fast cars. He's a hell of a leader as well for all the guys on this 12 team.

I give him props. He's still fairly new into this. I mean, '22 is when we started working together. He wasn't a crew chief long before that. He's done a great job. It's been fun to have success. Hopefully we can continue to have that together.

Q. In the old format it felt like the winner of the finale, if it wasn't the champion, kind of got overshadowed by the Championship 4. Are you hoping/do you think you guys will get your due this time, given the championship was already wrapped up?

RYAN BLANEY: I have no idea. How was the broadcast at the end of the race?

Q. It was good.

RYAN BLANEY: I don't know. Maybe, I don't know.

Yeah, I mean, don't really bother me at all. I just celebrate winning the race with my guys, things like that. I don't ever want to take away. The last two years winning the race without being a champion, I don't want to take away from those guys. I didn't even do a burnout after the race. I wave to the fans like I normally do, went to Victory Lane.

No, I mean, obviously this weekend is championship weekend. It's all over the screens in here. That is the main attraction. Celebrate the person and team that won the championship.

Also, yeah, celebrate the guys who won the race a little bit, right? It's not obviously the main focus. So I guess that's where I stand on it, yeah.

Q. You mentioned the restarts. What is it that makes keeping the lead so hard? Seemed like it's just dicing it out there.

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, there's a lot of different lanes to choose from here, especially short run. So you just hope you make the right decision. As the leader, you are the first guy making the decision. Everybody else does something different. The two or three people behind you do something different because they're looking for air.

The leader is, like, the first to jump in, testing the water. Sometimes it's cold, the two people know not to jump in. Sometimes it's warm, the leader hits it right and drives away.

It's just because there's so many options here. You can pick poorly every now and then. You never know when the bottom of three and four, how long it's going to be good. I mean, every lane in one and two is available. It just depends on where your car's the best.

I think here, honestly, more than most racetracks, it's really difficult to be the leader in those scenarios. It's so wide and so slick, if you miss it, you're stuck for the whole corner. Everyone behind you is just adjusting to you. I think that's why you've seen a lot of restarts here and things like that, the leader kind of lose out, where other places the leader can usually win after a couple laps.

Q. Jonathan talked about the stress load during the Chase. Now that you've had your first experience of the Chase, how mentally taxing has it been? Is it different from the Playoff experience?

RYAN BLANEY: I mean, I wouldn't say it's any more or less mentally taxing than the previous format. I mean, yeah, it's as stressful as you want to make it. This is what we go to the racetrack for every week, right?

You understand the pressure of trying to win a championship, for sure. Like me personally, I like that stuff. That's why I race cars. That's why I loved watching racing growing up.

I had a unique perspective on it because I saw my dad have to go compete every weekend. So I understood the pressure and the stress that came with racing and going to work every single weekend and trying to prove yourself. I love that stuff. I look forward to that.

To me, that's kind of the only way I've been able to do it. I look forward to the hard moments because you're going to have them. It's kind of how you ride that wave of stress, good times, stuff like that.

Q. I want to ask you about Kyle Larson. What is it about Kyle that makes him so great?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, I mean, that group in general is a very, very talented group. Kyle in particular. I mean, I knew about Kyle before he even came over to NASCAR. I knew how talented he was. Right when he got in the sport, he kind of changed the game. He's one of those guys.

I said this to him a few years ago when we were doing some roundtable discussion with a lot of the like the Next 9, the NASCAR Next 9 guys. He revolutionized running the wall.

I don't know if anyone knows that. Go look up when Kyle Larson came into the Cup Series in like '14 or even before, was then the Nationwide Series, nobody ran the fence like that. Everyone would kind of go in the middle, fade up to the top, come off of it. Kyle was one of the first guys I've ever seen just park it entering, two inches off the wall, and not getting two inches off the wall the whole way. That was a talent like I'd never seen before personally.

I think he's really good at finding the edge. He used to step over it a lot in his early days. He would always be at the edge, take himself out of contention. As he's gotten older, more experienced, he's really refined that skill of he's still on the edge but he definitely doesn't go over it a lot. That's really dangerous for the rest of us.

Obviously he's incredibly talented. His natural, God-given talent is off the charts. He is very deserving to win his third championship. That group makes it very hard on everybody in the garage. They're a very good team. Everyone has their work cut out for them to keep contending with that group, specifically that pairing of Kyle, Cliff, all those guys.

THE MODERATOR: Ryan, congratulations on this race win. Have a great off-season.

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, have a good winter.