Denny Hamlin reacts to Ryan Blaney two-lap run to win Daytona: 'Masterful in being patient'

So many different drivers had a shot at the win at Daytona in the regular-season finale on Saturday night. In the end, it was Ryan Blaney who surged from 13th place with two laps to go to take home the victory.

Blaney executed a masterclass as some of the more desperate drivers in front of him took their shots. And missed.

“He was masterful in being patient,” Denny Hamlin said on the Actions Detrimental podcast. “What I saw was he was very patient and if you notice, he didn’t make a whole lot of moves. He allowed others to make moves and then he just held steady.

“He knows who his help is. His spotter’s doing a good job telling him who’s behind him. At the time I think it was the 99 that was pushing him. He seemed pretty committed to him, so he wasn’t one of those guys weaving between lanes and all this other stuff. He just was very patient in saying, ‘The top line is going to prevail here, so I’m going to stay in it.’ And as people start to get toward the front, they’re peeling off to block and it’s just moving him up the queue of that line.”

Ryan Preece had a shot late. But he got himself in front of a couple of Hendrick Motorsports cars and they left him at the wrong time. He sank back into the pack.

Chris Buescher was pushing from second place but got a little impatient. It cost him. So on and so forth, for about half a dozen drivers.

“At some point he’s probably, what, fifth on the outside line?” Hamlin said of Ryan Blaney. “Well the leader just keeps pulling down, a new guy comes up front. He takes the lead, he pulls down, new guy. So he keeps moving up the queue as the laps go on. And then on the last lap, he just got the great push, he moved up.

“It was very timely and good heads up of him and his spotter to, off of Turn 4, move up in front of that top line. Because it looked like, at that time, who was on the bottom? Cole Custer off of Turn 4, I believe Cole Custer was to his inside. I thought he was going to have more help, but his help kind of died and the top lane was coming and Blaney was like, ‘I’m going to go back to the well.’ And that’s what got him pushed out to the front.”

Hamlin credited Ryan Blaney with knowing how to race the NASCAR superspeedways. And the evidence is all over the place.

There’s one hallmark trait of those that know how to do it, and it’s something Hamlin picked up himself as he matured as a driver. He explained.

“Listen, 13th at Martinsville with two laps to go is very, very different than being at Daytona with 13th with two laps to go,” Hamlin said. “Not only for distance, but time delta to the leader. While you’re 13th, you’re only actually a half a second from the lead. It’s not that big, but still you have to, as a driver, and where Blaney was impressive, is using his skill set to know push them out and then let them make a decision, and then I’ll figure out whether that decision is the right one or not, and I might go with you and I might not.

“So that’s where I found I got much better at superspeedway racing 10, 15 years ago. It’s that not necessarily having to be the one to make the move, but pushing someone else to make them make a choice, and then you have time to process whether that choice was right or not.”

Ryan Blaney did it to perfection. As a result, he scored his second win of the season and will head into the playoffs in fourth in the standings on points. Not a bad evening.