{"id":59723,"date":"2026-07-18T18:45:48","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T23:45:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/?p=59723"},"modified":"2026-07-22T09:05:00","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T14:05:00","slug":"heavy-rain-puts-ryan-blaney-on-pole-at-north-wilkesboro","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/18\/heavy-rain-puts-ryan-blaney-on-pole-at-north-wilkesboro\/","title":{"rendered":"Heavy rain puts Ryan Blaney on pole at North Wilkesboro"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service<\/em><\/p>\n

NORTH WILKESBORO, N.C.\u2014\u201cGreat lap,\u201d quipped Ryan Blaney on Saturday as he addressed reporters in the North Wilkesboro Speedway media center.<\/p>\n

\"\"

NORTH WILKESBORO, NORTH CAROLINA – JULY 18: Ryan Blaney, driver of the #12 Menards\/Duracell Ford, looks on during practice for the NASCAR Cup Series Window World 450 at North Wilkesboro Speedway on July 18, 2026 in North Wilkesboro, North Carolina. (Photo by Meg Oliphant\/Getty Images)<\/p><\/div>\n

Of course, there was no lap, after rain drenched the 0.625-mile short track and forced cancelation of qualifying for Sunday\u2019s Window World 450 (7 p.m. ET on TNT, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).<\/p>\n

As a result, Blaney will lead the field to green in the first NASCAR Cup Series points race at the track in three decades.<\/p>\n

Last Sunday\u2019s winner at EchoPark Speedway (Atlanta), Blaney is third in the series standings, 65 points behind leader Denny Hamlin and 41 behind second-place Tyler Reddick.<\/p>\n

With the top starting spot in Sunday\u2019s race, he\u2019s poised to make a dent in those deficits. Nevertheless, there are potential hazards that concern Blaney entering the race, notably the \u201csofter\u201d noses of the Cup cars.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the first race with the new bumper structure, and there\u2019s nothing behind that bumper,\u201d Blaney said. \u201cI mean, all the foam is gone. It\u2019s just body work, so they\u2019re going to be pretty flimsy, for sure.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome guys, I think, who have only driven this car, they didn\u2019t get to experience that in the other (previous generation) car, but that stuff is going to be flimsy, so you\u2019re really going to have to be careful on stack-ups, laying the bumper to somebody.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ty Gibbs will take the green flag from the second position, with Christopher Bell and Carson Hocevar third and fourth, respectively, on the second row. Reddick is fifth on the grid, followed by Erik Jones, Hamlin, Shane van Gisbergen, Chris Buescher and Chase Elliott.<\/p>\n

Blaney faces Bell in the semifinals of the $1-million In-Season Challenge, with Elliott taking on 18th-place starter Todd Gilliland in the other semi.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like that\u2019s going to be a real heck of a battle between me and Christopher this weekend,\u201d Blaney said. \u201cThey run really good on short tracks. We have a history of running really good on short tracks.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe won the All-Star Race here last year, so he\u2019s going to be really tough competition. So that\u2019s going to be a heck of a battle\u2026 It\u2019s been fun to be a part of it, that\u2019s for sure. I got knocked out after Round 1 last sure, so it\u2019s been fun to go through the bracket and see who you\u2019re up against.\u201d<\/p>\n

Three teams had inspection issues on Saturday. The 33 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet of Austin Hill and No. 88 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet of Connor Zilisch failed pre-race inspection twice and lost pit selection and the services of their car chiefs.<\/p>\n

The No. 1 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet of Ross Chastain failed three times. In addition to loss of pit selection and his car chief, Chastain will start from the rear of the field and serve a pass-through penalty after taking the green flag.<\/p>\n

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

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service NORTH WILKESBORO, N.C.\u2014\u201cGreat lap,\u201d quipped Ryan Blaney on Saturday as he addressed reporters in the North Wilkesboro Speedway media center. Of course, there was no lap, after rain drenched the 0.625-mile short track and forced cancelation of qualifying for Sunday\u2019s Window World 450 (7 p.m. ET on TNT, PRN and SiriusXM […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":676,"featured_media":59694,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_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},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[11],"tags":[16,774,435],"class_list":["post-59723","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nascar","tag-nascar","tag-north-wilkesboro-speedway","tag-ryan-blaney"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7hzTZ-fxh","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/racedaysa.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/GettyImages-2286690120-scaled.jpg?fit=2560%2C1706&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59723","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\/676"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59723"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59723\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":59724,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59723\/revisions\/59724"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59694"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59723"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59723"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59723"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}