1. Ryan Blaney Ended Toyota Dominance at New Hampshire, Which is Bad News for the Playoff Field
“In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” Benjamin Franklin first wrote those famous words in a 1789 letter, well before there were NASCAR races at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. So, he could be forgiven for not knowing that “Toyota drivers winning Next Gen NASCAR Cup Series races at Loudon” should be added to that short list.
However, Ben Franklin’s list is now once again accurate after Ryan Blaney made a statement by winning the Mobile 1 301. It wasn’t complete domination (we’ll get to that shortly), but Blaney led 116 laps, won stage one and fended off Josh Berry at the end.
Blaney doesn’t have the feel of a typical championship favorite, given that he’s won only three races and had some stretches of poor finishes earlier in the season. Those seem to be mostly behind him now, however, as he now has nine top-10 finishes and two victories in his last 10 starts.
The playoff format could give hope to Blaney’s competition … except it sets up nearly perfectly for him. Already assured a spot in the Round of 8, he’s won two of those three races within the past two seasons, including Martinsville Speedway both years.
Oh, and Blaney has finished second at the finale in Phoenix Raceway for three consecutive years, meaning in the very likely chance he makes the Championship 4, you probably need to win the race to nip him for the title. That’s going to be a tall task for anyone except perhaps someone under the same roof.
2. Joey Logano Is Defying His Own Recent History
Pretty much everyone who didn’t just become a NASCAR fan this season knows about the legend of even-year Joey Logano. That’s when he and the No. 22 team find their top form when it matters most, to the tune of 2018, 2022 and 2024.
Most of the 2025 campaign has seen Logano look like his usual odd-year self, which is to say a half-step off contender status. But something funny has happened the past three weeks, with Logano managing three straight top-five results for the first time in six years.
Of course, that means the last time he did it was 2019, when he failed to make the Championship 4. So, maybe this means nothing, and the odd-year trend will reassert itself.
But what if it doesn’t? Logano is pretty comfortably in position to advance to the Round of 8, barring disaster at both Kansas Speedway and the Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL. He’s won the fall Las Vegas Motor Speedway race two of the past three years and has as good a chance to win Talladega Superspeedway as anyone because it’s Talladega.
If he makes the Championship 4, it might be only the power of numerology or teammate Blaney who can keep him from championship number four.
3. Can a Championship Contender Spare the Energy to Feud With a Teammate?
I’m not going to spend time on an extensive breakdown of the issues between Denny Hamlin and Ty Gibbs as my colleagues either have or will be doing that. Who’s right and who’s wrong pales in comparison to a bigger question, which is whether it’s wise for someone chasing a Cup Series title to have any headspace at all taken up by perceived wrongdoing by a teammate.
Hamlin has famously never won a Cup championship, the only blemish on his otherwise impeccable Hall of Fame resume. He knows more than anyone, except perhaps Mark Martin, how difficult it can be.
Anything less than complete focus only makes it harder. Surely Hamlin realizes this, which might be why he was so noncommittal when asked if he would talk things through with Gibbs.
It could also be that Hamlin has some payback on his mind before the end of 2025. That seems unwise, if only because it should be championship or bust for the No. 11 team and anything else, even some organizational infighting, should be shuffled to the back burner until next year.
4. Fall Lobster Beats Summer Lobster
It continues to be unfortunate that we don’t have attendance figures to talk about from NASCAR races and instead have to rely on things like “Hey, the stands seemed a lot fuller this year,” anecdotal observations. That said, the stands at New Hampshire Motor Speedway seemed to have a higher occupancy rate than the last few trips there.
The solution to getting more butts in seats for some tracks on the Cup Series schedule over the last decade or so is to cut back from two race weekends to one. Loudon already had that card played for it in 2018, so that’s not what is going on here.
Instead, we look to this race’s place on the schedule. In its one-race era, New Hampshire has hosted NASCAR on a variety of different weekends, but always during the heat of the summer.
It could be just as simple as more fans being willing to come when it’s a little cooler. Or it might be that a playoff race is more attractive than a regular season date. Assuming it’s the former, it’s a tactic that NASCAR could potentially try at other venues, though ultimately, some tracks have to host races during the summer. No real way around that.
5. One Reason Richard Childress Racing to Dodge Makes Sense
On the spectrum of “rumors it is way too early to worry about,” which teams might end up with Dodge in the Cup Series should be right near the top. Dodge hasn’t even committed to a Cup return after all and hasn’t even run its first NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race yet.
But hey, those kinds of rumors are also the most fun, which is probably why Jordan Bianchi of The Athletic answered a question about it in one of his mailbags a few weeks ago. Specifically, he said that “Richard Childress Racing is an intriguing option” because of its engine program, which could form the foundation of Dodge’s entire top series effort.
Bianchi also pointed out something that has been burrowing into the back of my mind over the last few weeks: If RCR wants to be relevant again, it might have to do something drastic like switching away from Chevrolet.
He’s right. While the fortunes of race teams ebb and flow, it would take a catastrophic collapse for Hendrick Motorsports to fall from its perch as the top Chevy organization. Even then, a strong case can be made that Trackhouse Racing is ahead of RCR in the current pecking order, and the hottest young Chevy driver, Carson Hocevar, plies his trade for Spire Motorsports.
Add it all up and even though it is somewhat blasphemous to type it out, RCR is something of an afterthought even among Chevrolet teams. If it switched to Dodge, it would only need to be better than Kaulig Racing or whoever else ends up making a similar change. That sounds much more believable than a return to Chevy glory, and is something I’ll keep tucked away until we see if and when Dodge back at the top level of the sport.
