Ryan Blaney, a young talent in the Cup series, set the pace during Friday’s practice session at Sonoma Raceway. The newly paved road course led to significantly faster speeds for the teams, with Blaney’s lap of 97.866 mph being over 6 mph quicker than last year’s best lap.
Following closely behind was Ty Gibbs in second place with a top lap of 97.829 mph, and Will Brown in third place with a lap of 97.617 mph. Brown, who is making his Cup debut in the No. 33 car for Richard Childress Racing, showed great promise and could be looking to earn a ride for the 2025 season.
Meanwhile, in the Xfinity Series, Shane van Gisbergen led the way in practice with a top speed of 95.152 mph, followed by Parker Kligerman at 94.763 mph. Unfortunately, Boris Said crashed in the No. 17 car for Hendrick Motorsports during the session, adding an unexpected twist to what had been an otherwise smooth practice session.
As cup qualifying is set to begin at 6 p.m ET on Saturday and race taking place on Sunday afternoon it will be interesting to see how well these drivers perform under pressure and who will come out on top in this competitive field of rookies and veterans alike
