William Byron survives crash-filled final laps to win the Daytona 500
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — You can always count on two things about the Daytona 500. The predictable one is that there will always be a couple of race-defining wrecks in the last 10 laps. And the unpredictable one is the winter weather in Florida.
Those two factors were on display at this year’s Daytona 500 when William Byron was awarded the win when two cars pushing to get the lead from Byron tangled just past the start-finish line on the last lap.
That sent the decision of who was the winner to a video review by NASCAR and Byron had it nailed, leading Alex Bowman by .006 seconds. Not even close.
The race was held on a Monday for only the third time when two days of persistent rain pushed the schedule back.
It’s not unusual for the race to be interrupted by rain, but it’s usually finished the same night and doesn’t need to be postponed before it even starts.
If the schedule wasn’t topsy-turvy enough, NASCAR ran its Xfinity Series race about an hour after the 500 on Monday before an ever-diminishing crowd.
“I don’t know [what the difference was], just really good strategy,” Byron said. “We obviously laid back and tried to save fuel for most of the race and we would get up there at the end of the stages and make some moves. ... I’m just thankful for great power under the hood, all of our partners, Chevrolet, everybody who allows us to do this.”
The incident that gave the race to Byron was when Austin Cindric and Ross Chastain were down low pushing for the lead when they got loose and ended up in the infield.
Finishing behind Byron and Bowman were Christopher Bell, Corey LaJoie and Bubba Wallace.
But the race-defining action occurred with nine laps left when Bowman just nudged Byron who then tagged Brad Keselowski and by then a lot of the top cars were caught in a series of damage-inflicting crashes. When everyone stopped spinning, there were 23 cars involved.
About half of them were able to get to pit road and resume racing, and, obviously, Byron and Bowman were among them.
Three laps earlier there were six rows of cars racing three across the track. So, there was no way to avoid the inevitable and little blame directed at anyone.
The race was red-flagged for 15 minutes to clean up the track with eight laps to go. The race went to yellow for the next four laps and went green with four to go.
Among those who had to exit the race was Kyle Busch, one of five Cup Series winners to have never won the Daytona 500.
This was the 19th straight time he did not win. Others in that ignominious club are Kyle Larson (finished 11th), Chase Elliott (14th), Martin Truex Jr. (15th) and Keselowski (33rd).
Joey Logano was having a strong day and was competing for the lead when the incident happened. He led more laps (46) than any other driver, but it was good enough for only a 32nd-place finish.
“Speedway racing again,” Logano said. “It’s a lot of fun until this happens. It was pretty interesting with a lot of pushing and shoving there at the end. Our Mustang was so fast. I had the cars I wanted around me [at the end]. I had at least one I wanted around me, but just couldn’t make it work.”
The win was exactly 40 years to the day that Hendrick Motorsports ran its first NASCAR Cup race.
“I’m telling you, you couldn’t write the script any better,” owner Rick Hendrick said. “When we thought about coming down here the first time we didn’t think we should be here, we felt so out of place.
“We win this on our 40th to the day, so that’s just awesome.”
Bill and Chase Elliott have won the most popular driver award a combined 22 times. Now, Chase seeks to turn things around after a winless season.
Byron came to Hendrick Motorsports in 2018 when he was 20, replacing Jeff Gordon in the No. 24 car. Gordon, who won the Daytona 500 three times, became a vice-chairman of Hendrick in 2022.
“I wasn’t driving the car, but I feel like I was making every lap with him out there,” Gordon said. “It’s just crazy to watch these guys do what they do and do it so well. To watch them from this side of it makes me so happy, so proud. This is an amazing win, a huge win.”
Chase Elliott was the winner of the first stage and Ryan Blaney won the second.
Outside of the last eight laps, there was only one unscheduled caution near the start of the race on Lap 6 when Keselowski was bumped, causing him to turn into John Hunter Nemechek who then got into Harrison Burton and cars started going in different directions. One problem is cars that ended up in the infield were difficult to control because of the wet grass.
“Once I got in the grass I couldn’t slow down because it was so wet so I just slid and slid and slid and came across the rest of the field,” Burton said.
NASCAR’s first two races this year have been weather disasters. Two weeks ago the Busch Clash at the Coliseum was moved up a day because of the anticipated torrent of rain in Los Angeles.
And then there was this week. NASCAR is hoping things straighten out when they go straight to Atlanta for the next race.
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