{"id":53863,"date":"2025-08-09T14:10:04","date_gmt":"2025-08-09T19:10:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/?p=53863"},"modified":"2025-08-09T21:07:46","modified_gmt":"2025-08-10T02:07:46","slug":"blaney-nabs-upset-watkins-glen-pole-from-road-course-ace-van-gisbergen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/2025\/08\/09\/blaney-nabs-upset-watkins-glen-pole-from-road-course-ace-van-gisbergen\/","title":{"rendered":"Blaney nabs upset Watkins Glen pole from road-course ace Van Gisbergen"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service<\/em><\/p>\n

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. \u2013 Ryan Blaney claimed his second Busch Light Pole Award of the season Saturday afternoon at Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International \u2013 his second of the season, 15th of his career and second ever on a road course.<\/p>\n

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Ryan Blaney, driver of the #12 Menards\/Richmond Water Heaters Ford, poses for photos after winning the pole award during qualifying for the NASCAR Cup Series Go Bowling at The Glen at Watkins Glen International on August 09, 2025 in Watkins Glen, New York. (Photo by Sean Gardner\/Getty Images)<\/p><\/div>\n

For the first time in his NASCAR Cup Series championship career, he\u2019ll lead the field to green in Sunday\u2019s Go Bowling at The Glen (2 p.m. ET, USA Network, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).<\/p>\n

It was a dramatic effort for the driver of the No. 12 Team Penske Ford Mustang knocking the reigning road course master, Trackhouse Racing\u2019s Shane Van Gisbergen from the top spot on the speed chart by a slight .33-second with a lap of 122.568 mph around the historic 2.45-mile road course in scenic upstate New York.<\/p>\n

It was a markedly different day for the 31-year old North Carolinian Blaney a disappointing showing here a year ago when a poor qualifying effort left him in a vulnerable position \u2013 ultimately being eliminated from the race on the opening lap.<\/p>\n

He acknowledged that beating the road racing ace Van Gisbergen Sunday will be another story.<\/p>\n

\u201cNinety laps is going to be a little harder to beat him tomorrow, but gotta start somewhere\u2019\u2019 the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series champion said with a smile. \u201cIt\u2019s more neat for me because we had an absolutely abysmal weekend here last year. \u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve worked really hard on where we need to get better here, where I need to do a better job. How can we improve our race cars. So it was like a big dual effort.<\/p>\n

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Ryan Blaney, driver of the #12 Menards\/Richmond Water Heaters Ford, drives during practice for the NASCAR Cup Series Go Bowling at The Glen at Watkins Glen International on August 09, 2025 in Watkins Glen, New York. (Photo by Sean Gardner\/Getty Images)<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cJust proud of their dedication to get better at this place and improving the car from last year and I tried to work on a lot of things. I consider myself a pretty average road course racer and I\u2019ve worked really hard on trying to get better, where can I improve my driving skills and styles and compete a little bit more at these places and it\u2019s neat when that all comes together.<\/p>\n

\u201cI try to take these things one day at a time. Tomorrow is a whole different task but it\u2019s nice to have done our job really well today and now about focusing on trying to make 90 good laps tomorrow.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n

It is the 150th NASCAR Cup Series pole for Team Penske, making the storied organization only the fourth team in series history to eclipse that mark.<\/p>\n

Blaney and Van Gisbergen \u2013 who has three road course wins on the season \u2013 will lead the field to the green flag, followed by Joe Gibbs Racing\u2019s Chase Briscoe, Van Gisbergen\u2019s Trackhouse teammate Ross Chastain and Richard Childress Racing\u2019s Kyle Busch, who for much of the qualifying session looked to have had a front row start.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s not bad,\u2019\u2019 said a smiling Busch, who won from pole position at Watkins Glen in 2008.<\/p>\n

\u201cGreat job by everyone on this Chevrolet,\u2019\u2019 he added. \u201cFeels good to have a good solid effort like that right now.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n

Defending Watkins Glen race winner, Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing\u2019s Chris Buescher will roll off 12th in the No. 17 RFK Ford. He holds the 16th and final points position among the 16-drivers currently aiming for the Playoffs with three regular season races remaining. His teammate Ryan Preece sits just 23 points behind him in the standings and will start 17th.<\/p>\n

Their team co-owner Brad Keselowski, who also needs a victory in one of the remaining three regular season races will start 16th. Keselowski has back-up drivers on standby for the next three weeks as his wife Paige is due to give birth to their fourth child. Road course ace Joey Hand is at Watkins Glen.<\/p>\n

Championship points leader William Byron \u2013 the 2023 Watkins Glen winner \u2013 will roll off 10th. His teammate Chase Elliott, a two-time Watkins Glen winner who is 18 points behind Byron with three regular season races remaining will start 20th.<\/p>\n

Interview:<\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

NCS Pole Winner – Ryan Blaney (No. 12 Team Penske Ford) –<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. \u2013 Ryan Blaney claimed his second Busch Light Pole Award of the season Saturday afternoon at Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International \u2013 his second of the season, 15th of his career and second ever on a road course. For the first time in his NASCAR Cup Series […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":53854,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[11],"tags":[16,435,472],"class_list":["post-53863","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nascar","tag-nascar","tag-ryan-blaney","tag-watkins-glen-international"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/racedaysa.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/GettyImages-2229259849-scaled.jpg?fit=2560%2C1706&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7hzTZ-e0L","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53863","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53863"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53863\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53866,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53863\/revisions\/53866"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53854"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53863"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53863"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53863"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}