NASCAR All-Star Race: Ryan Blaney wins big at Texas Motor Speedway
The NASCAR Cup Series' May schedule continued Sunday with the highly anticipated All-Star Race in Fort Worth, Texas, and it certainly didn't disappoint.
Twenty-four drivers took to the track to battle for a cash prize of $1 million, and after a wild series of events, it was Ryan Blaney who came out victorious in this one — twice!
Joey Logano and his crew won the pit stop challenge, earning a cool $100,000 for their efforts.
Here are the top moments from Texas Motor Speedway:
Green!
The All-Star Race was made up of three 25-lap stages, followed by a fourth and final 50-lap stage.
Kyle Busch led the field into Turn 1 and built his gap over Blaney to 0.5 seconds five laps in.
Stage 1 in the books
Busch led every lap en route to winning Stage 1, followed by Blaney, defending champion Kyle Larson, William Byron and Kurt Busch.
Chaos ensues
Things got hectic in Stage 2. First, the hood was up on Kevin Harvick's car early.
Then, Bubba Wallace had to come to pit road under green with a loose wheel, while Blaney ended up going way up the banking after he tried to make a dive bomb in Turns 1 and 2 under Ross Chastain.
To the shock of many, Larson crashed hard off Turn 4, bringing out the first caution of the night.
Larson's car was towed to the garage after blowing a front tire on the track, ending his race early.
Huge impact draws red flag
The green flag was back out with eight laps to go in Stage 2 — but it didn't last long.
Kyle Busch had a tire go down on the front straightaway and went way off the pace. Chastain was unable to avoid him, collecting Chase Elliott in the process.
All three drivers were evaluated and released from the infield care center shortly after.
With Larson and Elliott having crashed out, the two winners of the last three All-Star Races were out of the running to repeat. That sequence allowed Austin Cindric to take the lead after starting in 12th place.
Stage 2: Check
The red flag was lifted, and Stage 2 ended with an overtime restart.
Cindric took the second stage, followed by Blaney, Byron, Daniel Suárez and Christopher Bell.
$100K cashout!
Logano and his crew won the pit stop challenge by having the fastest time overall from pit entry to pit exit, including the pit stop. The win allowed Logano to start third in Stage 4.
Third stage underway
Byron was the first off pit road and started up front in Stage 3, but Blaney quickly took the lead in Turn 3.
Then, Bell passed Byron and took second 10 laps in, but misfortune struck when Bell collided with the wall and brought out the caution flag with four laps to go.
Blaney takes Stage 3
Blaney won the third stage, which allowed him to start on the front row for Stage 4. Suárez, Logano, Michael McDowell and Cindric rounded out the top five for this stage.
Who wants to be a millionaire?
With Cindric and Blaney having won Stages 2 and 3 and Logano having won the pit stop challenge, the three Team Penske cars started 1-2-3, respectively, in Stage 4. The green flag was out as the final stage began.
Crash out of Turn 4
The caution came out when Erik Jones spun and crashed his way to the infield, ending his night early.
Meanwhile, Jones' crash eliminated the 1.2-second lead that Blaney had built over Cindric.
Final few laps
The green flag was back out with 21 laps remaining, as the race for the top spot heated up.
Not so fast!
Blaney finished first after leading for 74 total laps — but there was a hiccup on his way to securing the win.
As Blaney came to the checkered flag, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. crashed on the back straightaway to bring out the caution. The All-Star Race is required to finish under green, so the race continued to overtime, where Blaney had to fight to try and hold off the other drivers all over again.
Bizarre turn of events
What's more, because Blaney thought the race was over, he began unstrapping his window net to celebrate. Upon realizing the race was continuing, he frantically tried to latch the window net back on from the cockpit.
Winner!
Blaney was able to hold off Denny Hamlin, as he took the white flag again. Cindric, Logano, Suárez, Alex Bowman, AJ Allmendinger, Chris Buescher, Brad Keselowski and Bell rounded out the top 10.
