Ryan Blaney outlasts Carson Hocevar to win Cracker Barrel 400 at Nashville

For the first time this season, Ryan Blaney wins in the NASCAR Cup Series! The Team Penske driver outlasted Carson Hocevar at Nashville. He joins his Penske and Wood Brothers teammates as winners in 2025.

Carson Hocevar tried his best to get to Ryan Blaney after the final green flag pit stops. However, it wasn’t meant to be. Lapped traffic hurt both the 77 and the 12. But with the lead that Blaney had on Hocevar, that worked to his benefit more.

A really up-and-down race for several drivers. We saw a lot of two-tire stops and other strategy calls tonight. No late-race drama this year at Nashville, just a straight-up race with a green flag finish under green. Blaney put this one away late with smooth driving through traffic.

A Nashville night to remember for @Blaney! #NASCARonPrime pic.twitter.com/Tr37leb0ZN

— Sports on Prime (@SportsonPrime) June 2, 2025

This season has not been great for Ryan Blaney. He’s done well in points leading up to this weekend. However, the wins hadn’t come. There were a few tough finishes that left the 12 team feeling like they could have done things differently and ended up in Victory Lane.

After the finish, Ryan Blaney addressed the struggles this season. It sounded like he was relieved to finally get the win tonight. And, hey, no 5OT finish this year, either.

“I never gave up hope, that’s for sure. We’ve had great speed all year, it just hasn’t really, you know, been the best year for us as far as good fortune,” Blaney said. “But the 12 boys are awesome, they stick with it no matter how it goes, and it was great to finish one out tonight.”

Carson Hocevar tried to chase down Blaney, but he didn’t have enough clean air to do it. Denny Hamlin gets P3 while waiting for he wants for the birth of his son. Joey Logano, William Byron, Bubba Wallace, Erik Jones (!!!), Kyle Larson, Tyler Reddick, and Christopher Bell were the rest of the top-10. Full results here.

Ryan Blaney holds on to win at Nashville

This race was entertaining. There were enough cautions early on to make you wonder if we were going to get multiple overtimes late in the race. It didn’t happen, though, thankfully, and we are talking about a clean, green flag finish.

While Carson Hocevar finished P2 to match his career-best finish, he may have done too much. Hocevar spun Ricky Stenhouse Jr. out and put him into the wall early in Stage 2. It was a move that Stenhouse definitely took offense to. The Hyak Motorsports driver is one of many drivers that Hocevar has upset in recent races.

I think that Christopher Bell had one of the best performances. He got into the wall and managed to race back to a top-10 finish. Hell, Kyle Larson was mired back in like 32nd place during Stage 1 and by the end of the night, he popped up in P8. Another great race tonight came from Bubba Wallace. He overcame a speeding penalty on pit road to get P6.

Ryan Blaney joins Joey Logano, Austin Cindric, and Josh Berry as winners this year for Penske/Wood Brothers. All four drivers are in the playoffs now. Blaney also sits 7th in points after tonight. He is creeping up on that top-five. Michigan is next week and should be one heck of a race.