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Okay, let’s see now. Superspeedways? Check. Short tracks? Check. Intermediate tracks? Ch….aaah, maybe we better wait until after the race in Vegas before we call that one. Road courses? Ouch!
So, what’s all this, you ask? It’s a progress report on how Ford’s top Cup team, Penske Racing, is performing early in the season.
Ever since NASCAR went to the Next Gen car in 2022, Ford and Penske have struggled to get a handle on it. They ran pretty good on the superspeedways, but that tells you nothing because only two things matter on superspeedways, missing the “big wreck” and being in the right lane at the right time on the last lap. And that’s pure luck.
But wait a minute. Haven’t Penske and Ford won three out of the last four Cup championships? Yes, they have. All that indicates, though, is how much the NASCAR point system distorts what’s actually happening on the track. You don’t have to race to score points in NASCAR. You just have to finish the race.
This is evident when you look at the Old Guy Sport competition index, which rewards racing and leading laps under green, and compare Penske’s performance with Hendrick Motorsports and Joe Gibbs Racing, the other members of the “Big Three.” For our purposes, the Wood Brothers, Penske’s satellite team, is considered part of Penske to give them a fourth car.
And except for Ryan Blaney, Penske has simply not been competitive on the short and intermediate tracks, which host 26 of the 36 Cup races and are critical to any team’s success.
Take 2025. JGR scored 573 points on the short tracks, Hendrick 538 and Penske 467. Blaney, who may be the best driver in NASCAR right now, had 273, topping all drivers. Hamlin led JGR with 236 and William Byron had 192 for Hendrick.
On the intermediate tracks, JGR had 915 points, Hendrick 661 and Penske just 398. Hamlin led JGR and all drivers with 421 points, Larson had 300 for Hendrick and Blaney 220 for Penske.
As for the road courses, Penske is, well, horrible. Blaney was the only driver who had any points, 23. Since there are only four road courses on the schedule this year, though, Penske might survive with minimal improvement.
One thing is apparent from these numbers. Although he has won a championship, Blaney does not get nearly enough credit for being as good as he is.
This was evident at the start of this year when Blaney won the first short track race last Sunday at Phoenix. In fact with the exception of Austin Cindric, all the Penske cars plus Josh Berry in the Wood Brothers Ford ran extremely well, which could mean Ford is finally starting to turn the corner.
Blaney’s run at Phoenix was truly remarkable. On lap 94, he went into the pits third only to have to come back in because of a loose wheel. NASCAR penalized him and he went to the end of the lead lap which left him 24th.
He had fought his way back to 10th before pitting on lap 134 when again, his crew left a wheel loose, so he stopped in Joey Logano’s pit to fix it. Penalized once more, he went back to 38th.
On his last stop, with 25 to go, his crew went with a two tire change instead of four, Blaney came out of the pits third and went on to win the race. In all, he passed 49 cars.
“I kept the end goal in mind,” Blaney said in his post-race interview according to NASCAR’s website. “How do we get back to where we were? It (the loose wheels) happened early enough in the race to where we still had enough time to be able to try to get back up there. And we were able to do that.”
Now comes Las Vegas, an intermediate track, and except for Blaney, who qualified 6th, the Penske Fords are not off to an auspicious start. Joey Logano starts 21st, Cindric 31st and Berry 32nd.
If Ford is going to do anything this year, then somebody besides Blaney has got to step up. The intermediate tracks are critical to Penske – and Ford’s – success, and if only Blaney can go to the front, that doesn’t bode well for Ford, even if it has improved on the short tracks. Unless Penske can figure a way for Blaney to drive all his cars.
NASCAR NOTES
Three most likely winners at Las Vegas: 1-Denny Hamlin, 2-Chase Briscoe, 3-Ryan Blaney. Last year’s winner in spring race at Las Vegas: Josh Berry. Top five at Las Vegas last year: 1-Berry, 2-Dennis Suarez, 3-Ryan Preece, 4-William Byron, 5-Ross Chastain.
Last week’s Phoenix picks: 1-Blaney, 2-Byron, 3-Kyle Larson. Phoenix winner: Blaney. OGS season record, 1-1, .500.
Top 10 in OGS competition index after two races: 1-Christopher Bell 91 points, 2-Tyler Reddick 75, 3-Blaney 53, 4-Ty Gibbs 42, 5-Shane van Gisbergen 41, 6-Larson 30, 7-Michael McDowell 15, 8-Hamlin 11, Joey Logano 11, 10-
Briscoe 4.
Top 10 on intermediate tracks (tracks most similar to Las Vegas) last year: 1-Hamlin 421, 2-Briscoe 326, 3-Larson 300, 4-Blaney 220, 5-Byron 194, 6-Bubba Wallace 142, 7-Chase Elliott 103, 9-Chastain 102, 10-Logano 89.

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