Blaney, Elliott show youth ready to rise as Gordon, Stewart fade

— -- INDIANAPOLIS -- This was Jeff Gordon's final Brickyard 400, and it really couldn't have gone much worse for the five-time winner, who was involved in an early crash and finished 42nd.

Tony Stewart hasn't announced his retirement, but at age 44, the local favorite is in all likelihood in the latter stages of his NASCAR career. The Columbus, Indiana, native didn't fare much better, an unscheduled late pit stop dropping him to 28th place, the last driver on the lead lap.

But there's a new generation of Sprint Cup Series stars waiting in the wings, and they acquitted themselves pretty well in their first Brickyard starts.

Ryan Blaney bounced back from the disappointment of losing Saturday's Xfinity Series race to Kyle Busch on the last lap by driving the Wood Brothers Ford to a 12th-place finish on Sunday.

And Chase Elliott, the 19-year-old son of 2002 Brickyard 400 winner Bill Elliott and heir apparent to Gordon in the Hendrick Motorsports No. 24 Chevrolet in 2016, came home 18th in the fourth of his five scheduled Cup Series starts this year. Elliott's next Cup start is scheduled for Sept. 6 in the Bojangle's Southern 500.

Blaney, 21, is driving a part-time Cup schedule for the Wood Brothers while conducting a full Xfinity Series campaign for Team Penske. He suffered the most disappointing moment of his young career to date Saturday, making a slight mistake in Turn 2 on the last lap of the Lilly 250 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway to lose the lead and the race to Busch.

He had put that negative experience out of his mind until a reporter reminded him of it following Sunday's race.

"I kind of forgot about yesterday until you brought it up," he remarked.

"It's cool to do good for the JDRF [Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation] car and it's cool to have all the contest winners for Type 1 diabetes here," he added. "Good to bring them a good run, and yeah, it helps a little bit. It will definitely bring us good momentum for our next race in this car."

Blaney looked to have a comfortable lead in the Xfinity race at Indy until he caught the lapped car of Derrike Cope with three laps to go and lost momentum and much of his lead to Busch. The Xfinity Series' all-time leading race winner stalked Blaney into the final lap, forcing him to push wide in Turn 2 and allowing Busch to muscle past on the backstretch.

Blaney handled that loss with dignity and grace, and expressed fear that he was going to be "the laughing stock in the racing industry for a long time." But nothing could be further from the truth, as evidenced by many supportive tweets he received, including one from Dale Earnhardt Jr.

He was asked Sunday if he was aware of how JR Hildebrand crashed in the last corner of the last lap of the 2011 Indianapolis 500, handing the victory to the late Dan Wheldon.

"I remember watching it," Blaney recounted. "I remember what I thought, and I couldn't believe I was that guy too.

"That's the way things go, but you move on."

In this case, moving on meant getting back into the Cup car less than 24 hours later and turning in a quality performance that almost resulted in a top-10 result. Blaney finished a Cup Series career-best fourth at Talladega in May.

"It was a good run for us," he said of the Indy run. "I wish things played out a little better for us in the end, but it wasn't too bad when we finally got track position. That was so huge today. I thought when we got a little bit of clean air, we were pretty good. But it was hard to get that.

"We were in a good spot for that last restart but it really didn't go our way," Blaney continued. "I was wanting to get some help and the 2 car [ Brad Keselowski, who finished 10th] really didn't help us out. But I'm really proud of these guys. After starting 30th, we worked our way up there and I can't thank them enough."

It was an uplifting result for the Wood Brothers team, which suffered the disappointment of not being able to qualify for Blaney's last two scheduled Cup Series starts (July races at Daytona International Speedway and Kentucky Motor Speedway) due to weather.

The Wood Brothers' history at IMS dates to 1965, when they served as the pit crew for Jim Clark's Indianapolis 500 winning Lotus-Ford.

With the talented Blaney on board, the present and the future is bright for NASCAR's longest tenured team.

"We got some track position at the end by staying out, so we had older tires, and that hurt us a little bit," Blaney said. "I thought we were finally in a good spot on the inside for that last restart, but it was all about who would push you down the back and we didn't get a lot of help.

"Overall a solid day."