Ryan Blaney speaks out after becoming the victim of Kyle Busch and Brad Keselowski’s Talladega wreck

Team Penske driver Ryan Blaney's race ended early at Talladega as he suffered his fourth DNF of the 2025 Cup Series season. He didn’t hold back his frustration after getting caught up in a crash caused by Brad Keselowski and Kyle Busch during Sunday’s Jack Link’s 500 at Talladega Superspeedway.

The trouble started on Lap 43 in Stage 1, as several cars were trying to head to pit road. The No. 6 RFK Racing Ford of Keselowski made contact with Busch’s No. 8 RCR Chevrolet, causing both cars to slide up the track. In the chaos, they clipped Alex Bowman’s No. 48 Chevrolet and collected the No. 12 Advanced Auto Parts Ford of Ryan Blaney. Team Penske was unable to send Blaney out again due to the significant damage sustained at the right rear end of his car.

After the race, Blaney shared his view of the incident based on a replay he saw.

"It looked like a group of guys trying to get to pit road, and maybe some guys not knowing that they were coming to pit road and not giving them any room," Ryan Blaney said (via Speedway Digest). "I saw the 8 and 6 kind of get hooked together, and they were going up the track, so I kind of picked the bottom and tried to get out of there, and I think they clipped someone outside of them and the 6 came back into me and I got clipped in the right-rear."

"Oh gosh, man, another DNF. It just sucks," he added in frustration. "Just when we were kind of getting our momentum, and didn't even get to race today. We'll just move on to Texas."

In total, five cars were involved in the wreck, including Chris Buescher’s No. 17 RFK Racing Ford. Keselowski ended up finishing 36th, and Blaney was placed 37th. Between them, Keselowski and Blaney now have seven DNFs this season, three for the former and four for the latter, respectively.

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Dale Earnhardt Jr. shares thoughts on Ryan Blaney's pit road struggles

Despite the setbacks for Ryan Blaney in 2025 so far, his No. 12 car has shown decent speed in all the races. However, he has suffered from some pit road issues, which have led to him losing track position on several occasions this season. The race at Darlington Raceway was a good example of this, as he lost track positions multiple times during the race due to slow stops.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. recently weighed in on Team Penske's pit road issues. Speaking on his podcast, Dale Jr. said that while Blaney’s cars have shown strong speed on the track, pit road mistakes have held the No. 12 team back. He believes it’s something the team needs to address seriously, even suggesting that some changes to the pit crew could help.

"I would be resting on the fact that we’ve got speed..." Dale Jr. noted. "We may need to do some things different on pit road, we may need to move some people around on our crews, so forth, to try to find some balance." (49:35 onwards)

Dale Jr. also highlighted some positives. He said that Ryan Blaney and his team should stay confident because of the speed they are showing during races, even though they haven’t been able to turn that speed into wins yet.

The 2023 Cup Series champion will return to try his luck once again on Sunday, May 4, in the Würth 400 at Texas Motor Speedway.