NASCAR
A little luck, good instincts give William Byron second straight DAYTONA 500 win
By Reid Spencer
NASCAR Wire Service
DAYTONA BEACH, FL (February 17, 2025) – Like Houdini making an unlikely escape from a straitjacket, William Byron trusted his instincts and emerged from a smoky, last-lap wreck on the backstretch at Daytona International Speedway to win the DAYTONA 500 for the second straight time.
On Sunday night, after a long rain delay and a Presidential visit, Byron took full advantage when contact from Cole Custer turned three-time DAYTONA 500 winner Denny Hamlin at the front the field and started a wreck that gave Byron the opportunity he needed.
When Byron crossed the finish line 0.113 seconds ahead of runner-up Tyler Reddick in overtime, he became the first driver since Hamlin in 2019 and 2020 to win the Great American Race in consecutive years.
“Yeah, obviously some good fortune, but just trusted my instincts on the last lap there,” Byron said after climbing from his car. “I felt like they were getting squirrelly on the bottom, and I was honestly going to go third (top) lane regardless, because I was probably sixth coming down the back.
“Just obviously fortunate that it worked out in our favor. But just really proud of this team. Worked super hard all week and had an amazing car. Just had a really hard time with the fuel saving and kind of staying towards the front.”
“Crazy. I can’t honestly believe that. But we’re here. So proud of it.”
Last season, Byron claimed all three of his NASCAR Cup Series victories in the first 11 races. This year, after another Daytona win, he plans to sustain the momentum throughout the season.
“It’s an amazing race, and obviously a lot of crazy racing out there tonight and just a lot of pushing and shoving,” said Byron, who picked up his third victory at the 2.5-mile superspeedway and the 14th of his career.
“But just really proud of our team. I can’t stress that enough. I’m just super thankful for this group and everything that they do in the offseason to get prepared. We plan on trying to win a lot of races this year, so we’re not going to stop here. We’re going to continue to push forward and try to get to Phoenix (in the Championship 4 race).”
The wreck on the second lap of overtime frustrated both Hamlin, who was late to the lead and 2022 DAYTONA 500 winner Austin Cindric, who led a race-high 59 laps and combined with Team Penske teammates Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney to lead 125 of 202.
“Frustration—you’re taking the white as the leader,” said Cindric, who qualified on the front row and won Thursday’s second Duel at Daytona race. “I felt like I executed all the restarts the right way and really that whole third stage. I didn’t get wrecked out of the lead this time, so that was cool, but it still doesn’t make it feel any better.
“Obviously, I don’t even know where we finished, but it was still a decent points weekend and an incredible showing by our team for the entirety of Speedweeks. It’s just a shame we couldn’t get this Discount Tire Ford Mustang in Victory Lane.”
Hamlin had just pulled ahead of Cindric on the backstretch when Custer made a move to the outside and then steered down the track toward Hamlin’s No. 11 Toyota, triggering the crash.
“I measured up the 2 (Cindric), and got a run on him,” Hamlin said. “I stayed with him long enough where I could kind of control which side I wanted to pass him on, and then we had pulled away from the pack slightly, so I knew a run was going to come.
“The 41 (Custer) had a run, and I chose not to block him because these races, you have to live to make it off of Turn 4, and we just didn’t.”
Legacy Motor Club owner and part-time driver Jimmie Johnson finished third in his best result since 2020 at Dover. Pole winner Chase Briscoe was fourth and John Hunter Nemechek fifth, giving Legacy two drivers in the top five.
Alex Bowman, Blaney, Cindric, Justin Allgaier (in JR Motorsports first Cup race) and Chris Buescher completed the top 10.
The race was just over four laps from completion in regulation when a bump from Custer turned Christopher Bell hard into the outside wall on Lap 196. Bell’s Toyota bounced off the SAFER barrier and collected the Ford of Ryan Preece, whose car got airborne and landed on its roof before finishing upright.
That sort of wreck wasn’t unfamiliar to Preece, who endured a spectacular series of barrel rolls in the 2023 spring race at Talladega.
“When the car took off like that, it got really quiet, and all I thought about was my daughter,” Preece said. “So, I’m lucky to walk away.”
That wreck, which involved 10 cars, forced the race to overtime. An earlier melee on Lap 186, triggered by contact between Logano and Ricky Stenhouse Jr., changed the complexion of the race—eliminating Logano, Blaney, Kyle Busch, Chase Elliott, Brad Keselowski and Noah Gragson from contention for the win.
The 67th running of the Great America Race started in short bursts. With President Donald Trump in attendance and the grandstands packed with fans—reflective of a 10th straight sellout—drivers ran just nine green-flag laps from the start before rain interrupted the proceedings.
After a red-flag period that lasted 3 hours, 9 minutes, 59 seconds, drivers took to the track for a second time and ran another 12 laps under caution before a brief rainstorm halted the race for another 20 minutes, 29 seconds.
With Logano in the lead, the DAYTONA 500 resumed on Lap 24 and ran without incident until Lap 63 when the bottom lane checked up, and Zane Smith turned Hamlin’s Toyota on the backstretch.
Smith’s Ford slid up the track into the Ford of Josh Berry, seriously damaging that car. Smith took his car to the garage for attempted repairs, while Hamlin was able to continue without losing a lap.
Logano won the first stage under caution, but because of a problem with debris in the throttle body of his No. 22 Ford on the subsequent restart on Lap 71, Logano stacked up the top lane and ignited a seven-car melee in Turn 1. The accident eliminated the cars of Martin Truex Jr., Helio Castroneves and Ross Chastain.
Intense three-wide action throughout the race produced 56 lead changes among 15 drivers. Byron led five times for a total of 10 laps. There were eight cautions for 47 laps.
By Reid Spencer
NASCAR Wire Service
WINSTON SALEM, NC (February 4, 2026) – Neither rain nor sleet nor snow nor gloom of night could keep Ryan Preece from his appointed rounds at Bowman Gray Stadium.
On wet-weather tires, on a track peppered with a wintry mix during the 100-lap break, Preece navigated the glazed asphalt at the historic quarter-mile track to win the second Cook Out Clash staged in Winston-Salem, N.C.
Historically heavy snow already had forced postponement of the season-opening NASCAR Cup Series exhibition race twice, but for the 35-year-old driver from Berlin, Connecticut, the victory on Wednesday night was well worth the wait.
“I don’t even know what to say,” said Preece, tears in his eyes as he climbed from his car to the cheers of hardy fans who had braved the rain and bone-chilling temperatures. “To be honest with you, it’s been a freaking long road.
“It’s the Clash, but, man, it’s been years and years of grinding … Two years ago, I didn’t think I was going to have a job. I thought I was going back to Connecticut.”
Preece, however, secured a ride in the No. 60 Roush Fenway Racing Ford after Stewart-Haas Racing closed its doors at the end of the 2024 season.
On Wednesday night, he led the final 45 laps after taking the top spot on Lap 156, muscling his way past Shane van Gisbergen after a restart four laps earlier.
In a rock ’em, sock ’em free-for-all that featured a Clash-record 17 cautions, Preece pulled away after the final restart on Lap 182 of 200 to beat runner-up William Byron to the finish line by 1.752 seconds.
Preece is the third driver to win the Clash before winning a NASCAR Cup Series points race, joining NASCAR Hall of Famer Jeff Gordon and Denny Hamlin in that distinction.
The modified star, who started 18th and worked his way forward before and after the halfway break, extended one streak and broke another. He is the ninth straight different driver to win the Clash, but he’s the first to win from outside the first two rows since the Clash went to a quarter-mile format at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum in 2022.
Ryan Blaney ran third, followed by Daniel Suarez and Denny Hamlin. Chase Briscoe, Austin Dillon, Chris Buescher, Ross Chastain and Alex Bowman completed the top 10.
Pole winner and reigning Cup champion Kyle Larson led a race-high 67 laps to Preece’s 46, but Larson’s race fell apart after rain and sleet covered the track, leading to a 16th-place result after the change from slick tires to wet-weather rubber.
For the second straight year, Josh Berry raced into the main event from the Last Chance Qualifier. After passing AJ Allmendinger for the top spot on Lap 18 of 75, Berry led the rest of the way in the No. 21 Wood Brothers Ford and finished 7.419 seconds clear of runner-up Austin Cindric.
The field for the Clash wasn’t set, however, until AJ Allmendinger shoved Cindric past Corey LaJoie in the final corner, allowing Cindric to secure the second of two spots available through the LCQ.
From Lap 62 on, Cindric and Lajoie had battled for the runner-up position, with Cindric securing the inside position for the final four circuits.
“You, wanted to be on the inside, obviously, but you don’t want to pass the guy, ‘cause then he has the opportunity to get back to you,” said LaJoie, who was subbing for injured Brad Keselowski in the No. 6 Roush Fenway Keselowski Ford.
“It was exciting. It was fun to be in the fight. I hadn’t been in a fight like that in a long time.”
Allmendinger, who finished fourth behind LaJoie, was in the mix until the finish.
“I had the plan set up perfect,” said Allmendinger, who intended to move both Cindric and LaJoie up the track on the final lap. “I just didn’t execute. I went down in there to kind of shove ‘em both out of the way, and we didn’t have enough grip to throttle back up and beat ‘em to the line.”
Berry started 21st in the Clash and finished 12th. Cindric started 22nd and ran 21st after a litany of issues.
Bowman started last (23rd) in the Clash field on a provisional as the highest finisher in the 2025 standings not already in the field though qualifying or the LCQ.
MOORESVILLE, N.C. (February 3, 2026) – Four-time IndyCar Champion and three-time Indianapolis 500 winner Dario Franchitti is returning to the cockpit to compete in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series (NCTS) race at the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg presented by RP Funding.
Franchitti will drive the No. 1 Dollar Tree Toyota Tundra TRD Pro in a partnership between TRICON Garage (TRICON), Jimmie Johnson and Legacy Motor Club. (LEGACY MC) for the Scotsman’s first NASCAR race in 17-years.
“The thought of racing a NASCAR truck on a street circuit is really intriguing to me,” said Franchitti, who is an advisor and driver coach at Chip Ganassi Racing. “The different surfaces, the fact that part of it is on an airport, then you go into the streets, the different bumps all those things you got to try and master. This was just the chance to race on a circuit that I love, and a chance to do something fun.”
Franchitti has remained deeply involved in motorsports as a broadcast analyst and as an advisor and driver coach at Chip Ganassi Racing, following a brutal crash at Houston in 2013. Franchitti began competing in historic car events in 2019 allowing him to still fulfill his love of driving. Teaming up with his friend and fellow racing Champion made it all that much more intriguing.
“This all stemmed from a conversation with Jimmie,” said Franchitti. “The opportunity to race the truck, it was really him, it was the whole team that he has there [at LEGACY MC] that made it all happen. His relationship with Toyota, Dollar Tree coming on a sponsor — it’s all been through Jimmie and the team at LEGACY MC. If it goes well, great. If it doesn’t go well, I am going to be blaming Jimmie.”
Widely regarded as one of the most accomplished drivers of his generation, Franchitti has a decorated résumé at the highest levels of open-wheel motorsports. The Scottish driver captured the IndyCar Series championship in 2007 followed by three consecutive championships from 2009 to 2011. His 31 career wins between IndyCar and CART, highlighted by Indianapolis 500 triumphs in 2007, 2010 and 2012, includes a victory at the 1.8-mile St. Petersburg street course on March 27, 2011, in a dominant performance leading 94 out of 100 laps.
“Dario and I had been talking for a long time about the chance to race together, so when he approached me about St. Petersburg, I knew I had to get to work,” explained Johnson. “I called him back a day later with an incredible opportunity to join a championship-winning team with Toyota and the great people at TRICON.”
It will be role reversal to a degree for the duo as Franchitti mentored Johnson when the 7-time NASCAR Champion went IndyCar racing with CGR in 2021 & 2022.
“It’s been a lot of fun getting him integrated into the team and spending more time together, going through the process of getting him back to racing,” said Johnson. “I’m so excited it all came together and thankful that Dollar Tree is going to support. I am looking forward to sitting on the pit box alongside the team and sharing this experience with Dario.”
The NCTS Grand Prix of St. Petersburg is scheduled for Saturday February 28 at 12 p.m. ET, with broadcast coverage on FOX and radio coverage on SiriusXM and the NASCAR Racing Network.
By Reid Spencer
NASCAR Wire Service
(February 1, 2026) – Unexpectedly heavy snow from Saturday’s storm over the Southeast forced a second postponement of the Cook Out Clash at Bowman Gray Stadium in Winston-Salem, N.C.
The season-opening NASCAR Cup Series exhibition race will move from Monday to Wednesday, with practice and qualifying set to open the proceedings at 1:30 p.m. ET.
The 75-lap Last Chance Qualifying Race will take place at 4:30 p.m. ET, followed by the 200-lap Clash at 6 p.m. ET.
Practice and qualifying, consisting of three groups, will be broadcast on the Fox Sports App, with FOX picking up the coverage of the Last Chance Qualifier and Clash main event.
MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio will broadcast all components of the racing action on Wednesday.
“This event is for the fans, and the fans at The Madhouse are some of the most passionate fans in all of sports,” said Justin Swilling, project lead for the Cook Out Clash.
“Moving the Cook Out Clash to Wednesday, Feb. 4, gives us the best opportunity to hold this event with fans at Bowman Gray Stadium while allowing the City of Winston-Salem to dedicate all of their resources to respond to the needs created by this historic weather event.”
NASCAR is continuing to work closely with the City of Winston-Salem and North Carolina Department of Transportation on the on-going impacts of the historic winter weather in the city and surrounding region to host a safe event.
Parking lots will open Wednesday at 11:30 a.m. with off-site shuttle services beginning at noon. Gates will open at 12:30 p.m.
Ticket holders can get more information at www.nascarclash.com/weather or by calling 855-525-7223.
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