NASCAR Cup Series: Ryan Blaney wins 2019 1000Bulbs.com 500 in photo finish

Ryan Blaney earned his first victory of the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series season in the 1000Bulbs.com 500 at Talladega Superspeedway in a photo finish.

In thrilling fashion, Team Penske’s Ryan Blaney punched his ticket to the round of 8 of the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series playoffs by winning the second of three races in the round of 12 at Talladega Superspeedway, the 1000Bulbs.com 500.

Blaney held off Roush Fenway Racing’s Ryan Newman in what was a photo finish that produced just a 0.007-second winning margin for Blaney, the sixth closest finish in Cup Series history.

Here is a video of this photo finish.

Blaney, who spun out while leading the race coming into the pits yesterday before it was suspended to this afternoon due to rain, started this 188-lap race around the four-turn, 2.66-mile (4.281-kilometer) high-banked Talladega Superspeedway in Lincoln, Alabama in ninth place in his #12 Ford and led more laps than anybody else in the field with just 35 laps led.

More from NASCAR Cup Series

• NASCAR Cup Series: New team set to compete in 2024
• NASCAR: Surprising name continuously linked to new seat
• NASCAR driver at risk of missing the Daytona 500?
• NASCAR set for rare appearance last seen 13 years ago
• NASCAR team adds third car, names driver for 2024 Daytona 500

This victory is the third of Blaney’s Cup Series career and his first since he won the round of 16 playoff race at the Charlotte Motor Speedway roval late last September, and it prevented Newman from winning for the first time as the driver of the #6 Ford and for the first time since he won the race at ISM Raceway in March of 2017.

All 12 of the playoff drivers were involved in some kind of incident in this race, including Joe Gibbs Racing’s Denny Hamlin, whose goal until the final lap was simply to stay out of trouble after falling toward the back of the field late. He ended up leading the Toyota drivers by shooting to the front late and finishing in third place in his #11 Toyota. No other Toyota driver finished in the top 14.

Stewart-Haas Racing’s Aric Almirola and Front Row Motorsports’ Michael McDowell rounded out the top five by finishing in fourth and fifth place in their #10 Ford and #34 Ford, respectively. Richard Childress Racing’s Austin Dillon was the highest finishing Chevrolet driver of the race. He finished in sixth in his #3 Chevrolet.

Go Fas Racing’s Corey LaJoie, Hendrick Motorsports’ Chase Elliott, Roush Fenway Racing’s Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Germain Racing’s Ty Dillon rounded out the top 10 by finishing in seventh, eighth, ninth and 10th place in their #32 Ford, #9 Chevrolet, #6 Ford and #13 Chevrolet, respectively. Dillon finished just 0.370 seconds behind Blaney.

This race featured 46 lead changes among 19 drivers, nearly half of the field. Elliott, who started the race from the pole position, led 19 laps and was involved in the “Big One” toward the end of stage two before he ended up rallying to finish in eighth place, third best among playoff drivers.

Lap leaders aside of Blaney and Elliott were Newman, Almirola, Austin Dillon, Stenhouse, Team Penske’s Joey Logano, StarCom Racing’s Landon Cassill, Joe Gibbs Racing’s Kyle Busch, JTG Daugherty Racing’s Chris Buescher, Richard Childress Racing’s Daniel Hemric, Stewart-Haas Racing’s Clint Bowyer, Richard Petty Motorsports’ Darrell Wallace Jr., Team Penske’s Brad Keselowski, Chip Ganassi Racing’s Kurt Busch, Hendrick Motorsports’ William Byron, Joe Gibbs Racing’s Erik Jones, Petty Ware Racing’s Austin Theriault and Hendrick Motorsports’ Jimmie Johnson. Of these 19 drivers, 10 led between only one and three laps.

Byron won stage one while Bowyer won stage two. Only 25 of the 40 drivers who started the race were running at the end of it, with the majority of those cars running even after having sustained heavy damage at some point throughout the race, which featured a total of nine caution flag periods, including several for multi-car wrecks. The top 19 drivers finished on the lead lap.

Here are the full race results of the 2019 1000Bulbs.com 500 at Talladega Superspeedway.

Race Results
1st – Ryan Blaney
2nd – Ryan Newman
3rd – Denny Hamlin
4th – Aric Almirola
5th – Michael McDowell
6th – Austin Dillon
7th – Corey LaJoie
8th – Chase Elliott
9th – Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
10th – Ty Dillon
11th – Joey Logano
12th – Ross Chastain
13th – Matt Tifft
14th – Landon Cassill
15th – Parker Kligerman
16th – Paul Menard
17th – Kevin Harvick
18th – Ryan Preece
19th – Kyle Busch
20th – Chris Buescher
21st – Daniel Hemric
22nd – Reed Sorenson
23rd – Clint Bowyer
24th – Darrell Wallace Jr.
25th – Brad Keselowski
26th – Martin Truex Jr.
27th – Brendan Gaughan
28th – Kurt Busch
29th – David Ragan
30th – Matt DiBenedetto
31st – Blake Jones
32nd – Daniel Suarez
33rd – William Byron
34th – Erik Jones
35th – Austin Theriault
36th – Joey Gase
37th – Alex Bowman
38th – Jimmie Johnson
39th – Kyle Larson
40th – Spencer Boyd

The Hollywood Casino 400 is the next race on the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series playoff schedule, and it is set to be broadcast live from Kansas Speedway in Kansas City, Kansas on NBC beginning at 2:30 p.m. ET on Sunday, October 20.