Penske Reshuffles Ryan Blaney’s Pit Crew After Controversial Start to 2026

What’s Happening?

Team Penske has swapped a crew member off Ryan Blaney’s No. 12 team following a week’s worth of discussion surrounding the pit crew’s recent performance.

• This weekend, Blaney’s team will have a new jackman, Patrick Gray, who is an experienced in-house option. Gray, who started the season on Josh Berry’s No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing team, a satellite team of Penske, will be replaced by Landon Honeycutt at WBR.
• Though this is just a swap of one crew member on the No. 12 team, after this past weekend at Bristol, it felt as if it was only a matter of time until the team made a change. Over the first few races of the season, Blaney’s team has lost a number of spots during pit stops.
• Since the start of the season, fans and industry members have been perplexed by the slow start for Blaney’s team. While this is a move towards change, some fans online are already saying a more drastic overhaul is necessary.
• Changing out pit crew members mid-season is nothing new in NASCAR, but that doesn’t mean it won’t affect performance. In the past, some teams have opted to switch out entire pit crews as a unit.

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