Ryan Blaney earns NASCAR fans' empathy following heartbreaking fuel-mileage mishap at WWT Raceway

Ryan Blaney was just two laps away from clinching his playoff berth at the World Wide Technology Raceway. However, his car ran out of fuel unexpectedly. The fans empathized with the reigning NASCAR Cup Series champion as he missed out on what could have been his first win of the season.

As the white flag came out, Blaney's number 12 Ford Mustang Dark Horse started slowing down, leaving an opening for a fast-charging Austin Cindric, his teammate. While Cindric drove to Blaney's inside, grabbing the lead and his second career win, the latter had to settle for a 24th-place finish.

NASCAR posted a video of the mishap and captioned it:

"A heartbreaker."

Fans rallied behind Blaney with one calling it a heartbreaking moment.

"Big time Heartbreaker. Wow. Exciting stuff NASCAR," the fan said.

Another fan realized how unfortunate things turned out to be for the 30-year-old racecar driver and commented,

"Yea poor guy."

Here are some other comments on Ryan Blaney closely missing out on having a solid day.

"So sad!!! Hate it for Blaney and his team!" a fan said.

"At that level, with all the technology that’s available to them, running out of fuel inside a fuel window is absolutely unacceptable," said another.

Suggesting that someone should be penalized for this, a fan said,

"Somebody needs to be fired."

Currently, Ryan Blaney sits 12th in the NASCAR Cup Series standings with 405 points, 100 points ahead of Austin Cindric, who is 18th at this time. Cindric's victory was also his first top-5 performance on a non-superspeedway.

Despite WWT misery, Ryan Blaney is happy for Team Penske

Ryan Blaney could have brought Team Penske their first win of the season. However, it was Austin Cindric who was able to do the job. Nevertheless, Blaney walked up to the podium and congratulated him on the win.

Ryan Blaney congratulates teammate Austin Cindric after the latter won the Enjoy Illinois 300

"It was a good day for our cars to run first, fifth and we were there in the top five,” Blaney told NASCAR. “Proud of the effort, and I’m proud a Penske car won. I don’t think we were the fastest. Bell seemed like he shot out of a cannon. I don’t know where he came from, so battling him was tough."

However, according to Blaney, getting relegated from the front of the field to 24th wasn't what the number 12 team deserved.

"It just sucks we don’t end up with a finish that we deserve. I thought we did a good job all day doing what we needed to do. It’s a kick in the n**s but you move on past it," he added.

Both Blaney and Cindric will now prepare for the upcoming race at Sonoma Raceway on June 10. The race will air live on Fox Sports 1, with radio updates on MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR radio.