Blaney Holds off Byron to Win at Michigan

 Originally written for CLNS Media.

Ryan Blaney won the FireKeepers Casino 400 from Michigan International Speedway on Sunday afternoon.

Blaney chose the bottom lane ahead of the final restart, and a big push from Kyle Busch got him ahead of William Byron coming out of Turn 2.  Blaney was able to hold off the hard-charging Hendrick Motorsports duo of Byron and Kyle Larson to pick up his second victory of the season.

Blaney started toward the front of the field on Sunday, but fell back at the drop of the green flag after he struggled with his car’s handling.

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Blaney said his team worked on the car all day to get it ready for the finish.

“We weren’t great to start the day off,” Blaney said.  “Kept working and working and got a lot better.”

Blaney said the race came down to the final restart where a push from Busch got him to the lead.

“Picked a good lane on the restart there and was able to get the push we needed,” Blaney said.  “Michigan’s a matter of…holding it wide open and pretty much playing the air game.  We got a great push by the 18 [of Busch] on the restart and was able to get clear.”

Byron finished second on Sunday after he couldn’t overcome NASCAR’s 550 horsepower package that keeps racing close but sometimes makes it difficult to pass.

Byron said he was a victim of the superspeedway-like racing that left him without a true partner on the restart.

“Needed [Denny Hamlin] to stay with us,” Byron said.  “I gave up the lead trying to protect the top and just didn’t have the loyalty there to kind of push me into the lead.”

“It was kind of like a speedway race.  I was trying to back up to [Larson] off of four to get a run with about two laps to go.  Unfortunately, he ran the bottom so he didn’t have any momentum to push me.”

Unofficial results:

1. Ryan Blaney

2. William Byron

3. Kyle Larson

4. Kurt Busch

5. Denny Hamlin

6. Matt DiBenedetto

7. Kyle Busch

8. Chase Elliott

9. Brad Keselowski

10. Martin Truex Jr.

11. Chase Briscoe

12. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

13. Christopher Bell

14. Kevin Harvick

15. Chris Buescher

16. Alex Bowman

17. Aric Almirola

18. Erik Jones

19. Bubba Wallace

20. Michael McDowell

21. Ryan Preece

22. Daniel Suarez

23. Cole Custer

24. Ryan Newman

25. Justin Haley

26. Josh Berry

27. Cody Ware

28. BJ McLeod

29. Tyler Reddick

30. Quin Houff

31. Josh Bilicki

32. Garrett Smithley

33. Joey Logano

34. Anthony Alfredo

35. Ross Chastain

36. Austin Dillon

37. Joey Gase

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