NASCAR insiders sound alarm about Ryan Blaney's pit crew struggles after Darlington

Ryan Blaney had overtaken William Byron and appeared to be on the fast track to a win. His car was the fastest on the long runs and he had only a few laps to go.

Then Kyle Larson hit the brakes hard after Tyler Reddick bumped the wall in front of him. Bubba Wallace didn’t anticipate Larson getting out of the gas quite that hard, and he made contact with Larson, spinning him around.

Out came the caution. And the race on pit road began.

When it ended, Ryan Blaney had fallen back to the second row, losing incredibly valuable track position heading into an overtime restart. He would finish in fifth after a somewhat poor restart.

A pair of NASCAR insiders dished on where the fault lay after the race. And it was hard to ignore.

“Blaney also loses the front row there and that was the second time today that Blaney’s pit crew really hurt him or a bad pit stop,” The Athletic’s Jeff Gluck said on The Teardown podcast. “At one point he went from fourth to 16th. So, you know, pit crew on a day like this.”

That statement was immediately echoed by his co-host on the podcast, Jordan Bianchi. Bianchi pointed out just how important the pit stops were for Ryan Blaney.

“Pit crew is everything,” Bianchi said. “That’s going to win you or lose you the race, and that’s literally what happened today.”

Ryan Blaney’s crew chief defends pit crew

Following the race, crew chief Jonathan Hassler explained what happened on the last pit stop. Ryan Blaney has relied on his pit crew before to win races, but this time they fell just a little bit short.

“The group’s perfectly capable,” Hassler explained, via Matt Weaver of Sportsnaut. “We’ve just got to clean it up, and we’ll be there, hopefully, sooner rather than later.”

Weaver asked Hassler about the strategy they used. Ryan Blaney, like he has in other races, was seemingly the only driver capable of racing through traffic and dirty air. That is why he was in a position to win in the first place.

“Yeah, I mean, I think that was really kind of our only play from where we were running to maybe have a shot to win or a good finish,” Ryan Blaney’s crew chief explained. “We weren’t going to pit early when those other guys pitted and get to the lead. So, we just kind of chose to do something different, and it worked out.”

While the final stop was clean, there were mistakes on pit road. Hassler could think of one off the top of his head postrace.

“I think so, and if you look they definitely had one mistake with the jack that cost us a lot of time,” Hassler continued. “Our last stop was clean. A 9.3, I think, but guys were running low 8s. The 24 I think we matched his time there on the last stop, but in pit stall one, you just have that advantage. So, you know, I think it’s like anything else in the sport. Just takes a little bit of change to go a long way and I think we’ll be able to recover from this.”