Woes continue for Briscoe, Blaney at Las Vegas
LAS VEGAS – Although Chase Briscoe and Ryan Blaney have had speed since finishing in the top 5 during the Daytona 500, neither driver has had any luck.
The misfortunes continued in Sunday’s Pennzoil 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway as Blaney and Briscoe each scored a DNF as the second and third drivers to fall out of the race.
Blaney fell out of the race after a wreck in turn four with former teammate Brad Keselowski. Keselowski spun exiting turn four and Blaney hit the driver side of his car in the smoke.
“I’m not happy about anything and I don’t mean to be happy about anything when someone loses it right in front of you and ends our day,” Blaney said. “I won’t call it bad luck, but when someone just spins out in front of you and wipes you out, there’s nothing to be happy about. We had a pretty fast car and nothing to show for it.”
Blaney led 10 laps and finished 7th in Stage 1, earning four stage points. Blaney also earned 11 stage points Feb. 27 at Auto Club Speedway.
Briscoe wrecked into Daniel Suarez exiting turn four on Lap 94. The wreck knocked the toe out on his car and put him farther back, which set up a Lap 136 incident where he spun and hit the wall.
Briscoe went to the garage afterward and fell out of the race.
“I would say the last 5-10 laps before I finally spun out, the rear was bouncing really really bad and I think it broke something or the tire went down. I don’t know. I just went in the corner and the thing spun out,” Briscoe said. “It’s just really unfortunate. I thought we were gonna be really really good. We’ve had good speed all year long, so we’ll just try to dig out of a hole next week.”
Briscoe did not lead any laps but finished 8th in Stage 1, earning three stage points. Briscoe also earned 7 stage points at Auto Club.
Blaney and Briscoe each sit in a playoff spot after three NASCAR Cup Series races, in 13th and 14th respectively.
Blaney holds a playoff spot by 6 points and Briscoe holds a spot by 5 points, as the series goes to Phoenix Raceway March 13 (3:30 p.m. ET; TV: FOX, Radio: MRN/Sirius XM NASCAR Radio).
