NASCAR Cup Series: Ryan Blaney making big strides after rocky start to 2019

After a rocky start to the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series season, Ryan Blaney has made big strides to assert himself as a regular contender to win races.

Team Penske’s Ryan Blaney did not struggle to show speed to open up the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series season, as he led a combined 54 laps in the season opener, the Daytona 500, at Daytona International Speedway and in the season’s second race, the Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500, at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

But it took until the season’s fourth race, the TicketGuardian 500, at ISM Raceway, before the 25-year-old High Point, North Carolina native actually finished a race inside the top three — and the top 20.

Blaney finished in 31st place in the season opener before finishing in 22nd in the season’s second race. He then went on to finish in 22nd in the season’s third race, the Pennzoil 400 presented by Jiffy Lube, at Las Vegas Motor Speedway as well.

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Through the season’s first three races, Blaney’s average finish was a disappointing 25.00. Among the sport’s 32 full-time drivers, only the average finishes of Front Row Motorsports rookie Matt Tifft (32.67), Richard Petty Motorsports’ Darrell Wallace Jr. (30.33), StarCom Racing’s Landon Cassill (30.00) and Richard Childress Racing rookie Daniel Hemric (25.67) were worse than Blaney’s at this point.

But Blaney has since shown why he was a trendy preseason pick to make a deep run in this year’s playoffs by reeling off three consecutive top five finishes, including a fifth place finish in the season’s fifth race, the Auto Club 400, at Auto Club Speedway and a fourth place finish in the season’s sixth race, the STP 500, at Martinsville Speedway to go along with his season-high third place finish in the race at ISM Raceway.

As a result, the driver who finished in ninth place in the 2017 championship standings after advancing to the round of 8 and 10th in the 2018 standings after advancing to the round of 12 has skyrocketed to eighth in this year’s standings, and his average finish his made a jump up to a solid 14.50, which would be the highest average finish of his Cup Series career over the course of a full season.

But even these impressive statistics may not quite illustrate the strength that the driver of the #12 Ford has begun to show.

Blaney has led 150 laps so far this season, a laps led total that trails only the laps led totals of the two drivers who have won two Cup Series races so far this season (Team Penske’s Brad Keselowski, 538 laps led, and Joe Gibbs Racing’s Kyle Busch, 361 laps led). He trails only teammate Joey Logano in that he has led laps in four of the season’s first six races, as Logano has led laps in five of them.

Additionally, Blaney’s stage point total of 63 ranks third among the stage point totals of all drivers, as he trails only Stewart-Haas Racing’s Kevin Harvick (69 points) and Logano (68 points) in that category through the season’s first six races.

Will Ryan Blaney’s recent hot streak continue, and if so, for how long? When will he earn his first victory of the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series season, and how many victories will he earn before the season concludes? Where will he finish in the championship standings? If his current level of performance is any indication of things to come, he could very well make a serious run at winning this year’s championship.