LEBANON, Tenn. — A look at the winners and losers from Sunday night’s Cup race at Nashville Superspeedway.
WINNERS
Ryan Blaney — He led 139 laps, including the final 32, to score his first Cup victory of the season. It marks the eighth time in the last nine seasons that he’s scored at least one Cup victory. “It was nice to finally get in Victory Lane tonight after a rocky start to the year,” said Blaney, who has failed to finish five races this year.
Team Penske — Becomes the first organization to have all of its drivers win a race this season. Team Penske has won three of the last five points races — Austin Cindric at Talladega, Joey Logano at Texas and Ryan Blaney at Nashville. Also, the Wood Brothers are aligned with Team Penske and won at Las Vegas with Josh Berry earlier this season.
Carson Hocevar — Tied his career-best finish by placing second at Nashville.
Denny Hamlin — Placed third at Nashville. It’s his fifth top-five finish in the last nine races.
Erik Jones — His seventh-place result is his second top-10 in the last four races. Not a bad way to head to Michigan, his home track, this weekend.
LOSERS
Justin Haley — His 32nd-place finish marks the third consecutive race he’s finished 30th or worse.
Ty Gibbs — He finished 31st at Nashville. That marks the fourth race in a row he’s placed 23rd or worse.
AJ Allmendinger — NASCAR caught the team making an adjustment to the car after it had gone through inspection Saturday. He had to perform a stop-and-go penalty after taking the green flag in Sunday’s race. He lost a lap. With the first stage run without a caution, he got stuck a lap behind and was mired deep in the pack. He eventually got his lap back and finished 20th. The day could have been better had they not had the penalty.
