Amy Kontras/Getty Images
Blaney and Logano lead Team Penske 1-2 in final NASCAR practice at WWTR
Ryan Blaney and Joey Logano led a Team Penske 1-2 in NASCAR Cup Series practice at World Wide Technology Raceway.
Blaney (C) led the way at 135.665 mph (33.170 seconds) and ran 73 total laps.
“I thought we had decent speed,” Blaney said. “I’d like to keep improving it for the longer run, for sure. Overall, we’re in the ballgame; we just have to keep working on it and see what we get to overnight.”
Logano (C) clocked in at 135.514 mph.
“It’s pretty good,” Logano said. “The Shell Pennzoil Mustang had good speed on the short run, hung pretty good on the long run, was able to run lanes that it seemed like the majority weren’t running. … Yeah, looking pretty good.”
Josh Berry was third fastest at 135.501 mph, Connor Zilisch was fourth fastest at 135.371 mph, and Tyler Reddick (C) was fifth fastest at 135.398 mph. Carson Hocevar (C) was sixth fastest at 135.099 mph, followed by his Spire Motorsports teammate Daniel Suarez (C), seventh fastest at 134.868 mph.
“I feel like our short run speed is not bad, and I feel like we got our long run speed better there at the end,” said Zilisch.
Chase Elliott (C) was eighth fastest at 134.848 mph, Todd Gilliland was ninth fastest at 134.831 mph, and William Byron (C) was 10th fastest at 134.795 mph.
The rest of the Chase contenders in practice were Ryan Preece in 11th (134.779 mph), Christopher Bell in 12th (134.694 mph), Austin Cindric in 13th (134.658 mph), Bubba Wallace in 19th (134.413 mph), Ty Gibbs in 24th (134.104 mph), Kyle Larson in 25th (134.044 mph), Chase Briscoe in 29th (133.718 mph), Denny Hamlin in 30th (133.670 mph), and Chris Buescher in 35th (132.826 mph).
Hamlin is the defending race winner.
Blaney was fastest in the best five, 10-lap, and 25-lap averages. Bell was fastest in the best 15-, 20-, and 30-lap averages.
No incidents occurred during the 50-minute session.
Buescher’s team failed inspection twice with his No. 17 Ford. As a result, the team lost pit stall selection for the race, and car chief Joshua Sisco has been ejected.
There are 36 teams entered for Sunday’s race.
(C) denotes Chase driver.
Kelly Crandall
Kelly has been on the NASCAR beat full-time since 2013, and joined RACER as chief NASCAR writer in 2017. Her work has also appeared in NASCAR.com, the NASCAR Illustrated magazine, and NBC Sports. A corporate communications graduate from Central Penn College, Crandall is a two-time George Cunningham Writer of the Year recipient from the National Motorsports Press Association.
Read Kelly Crandall's articles
Latest News
Comments
Comments are disabled until you accept Social Networking Cookies. Update cookie preferences
If the dialog doesn't appear, ad-blockers are often the cause; try disabling yours or see our Social Features Support.
