Who… should you be talking about after the race?
Racing is as much about being in position to capitalize on a situation as it is raw speed. In Sunday’s (Feb. 16) Daytona 500, a repeat win didn’t really enter the conversation … until the final lap.
William Byron didn’t have the best car all week or even all day. Running ninth as the white flag flew, he was in position for a solid finish, but fighting his way through the pack was unlikely.
More likely: a last-lap crash. That’s exactly what happened at the front of the pack, the leaders spinning and scattering as Byron drove right on by with Tyler Reddick in tow. Reddick didn’t have help for a run though, and Byron took his second Daytona 500 in a row with Reddick settling for second.
"We're not gonna stop here."@WilliamByron is just getting started. 😏 pic.twitter.com/Hf1NeSLuAC
— NASCAR (@NASCAR) February 17, 2025
On the other hand…
The best-laid plans for avoiding trouble are no guarantee. Three-time Daytona 500 winner Denny Hamlin stayed out of the hornet’s nest for most of the day after getting shunted out of line early.
Thanks to the spectacular save Hamlin pulled off at the end of stage one, he prevented a much bigger issue than it could have been.
Stage 1 ends under caution. Here's what happened. #NASCAR #DAYTONA500 pic.twitter.com/Txgc9sZO3h
— FOX: NASCAR (@NASCARONFOX) February 16, 2025
It was a stellar move by the veteran to save his day early on, but his luck didn’t hold. Battling Austin Cindric for the lead on the final lap, both drivers got out of shape being pushed from behind as the racing grew frantic, and got tangled in a crash on the backstretch. Hamlin finished 24th after nearly seeing the checkers.
What… does this mean for the points standings?
It’s true that one race doesn’t win or lose a title. Because of the prestige of the Daytona 500 and its placement at the beginning of the season, it’s easy to forget about the points. Teams and drivers do take chances they might not take in another race to try and win it.
But the points do matter. Drivers who did well in the Duels have an advantage before the race even starts. Past playoff battles have come down to the final regular season race, so not only does the win take all the pressure off of Byron, but coming away on solid ground at the top of the standings allows drivers to approach the next few weeks differently, particularly with the second race being at Atlanta Motor Speedway, where chaos can also rule the day.
Despite getting caught in an incident midrace, Ryan Blaney leaves Daytona with the points lead after winning the second stage and coming back for a seventh-place finish. Byron sits just one back, and Cindric two points behind him thanks to his Duel win and eighth-place finish even after the last-lap crash.
Cup points (25 to go): Byron-1w, Blaney +30, Cindric +27, Reddick +23, Bowman +21, Buescher +19, Jones +19, Johnson +13, Nemechek +13, Briscoe +12; Elliott +12, TDillon +10, Suarez +8, McDowell +6, Stenhouse +5, Gibbs +0, Logano -0, Herbst -1, LaJoie -1, Hamlin -1, Keselowski -1 pic.twitter.com/Nm4euIvpXx
— Bob Pockrass (@bobpockrass) February 17, 2025
On the other side of the coin, Kyle Busch finds himself 35th leaving Daytona International Speedway after an early exit, starting the season 46 points in arrears. Title favorites Christopher Bell and Kyle Larson also need a bounce back, sitting 28th and 26th, respectively. Of course, a win makes the deficit go away, so there’s certainly no reason to worry. But consistency will be key heading into the next weeks.
Where… did he come from?
There were flashes of his past prowess all week, but it appeared for much of the race that Jimmie Johnson was once again struggling to run with the field after starting 40th. But a great pit call put him among the leaders early in the final stage. On the last lap, he avoided the carnage with a vintage Johnson move and passed Chase Briscoe for third coming to the checkers.
Johnson has struggled in his handful of starts in the Next Gen car, which is the antithesis of the heavy, high-horsepower machines that he drove to seven championships.
Sunday brought redemption, the high note the Hall of Famer deserves to end his career. He’s not quite done, with at least the Coca-Cola 600 on this year’s schedule, but his race Sunday felt like enough — he showed that he can still wheel a car and won’t fade into the sunset without a last stand.
Johnson’s team also had a strong race that it badly needed. All three Legacy Motor Club drivers finished in the top 12, with John Hunter Nemechek a solid fifth and Erik Jones in 12th after getting damage in a crash with under 10 laps to go.
The team also featured prominently in a commercial with manufacturer Toyota’s other Cup teams, a first. Has Toyota ramped up support in the wake of the uncertainty surrounding 23XI Racing and their lawsuit with NASCAR? Time will tell on that, but Sunday was a stellar day for the organization, and especially its owner.
When… was the moment of truth?
It’s Daytona, which always provides several installments for the highlight reel.
Multi-car crashes were the name of the game all weekend, and Sunday was no different once the race got started after a pair of early rain delays.
Hamlin‘s stage one save prevented a much bigger problem and looked fantastic for the fans.
Not so fantastic: the stack-up on the stage two restart. When leader Logano had an engine issue on the restart, the field stacked up behind him, causing a multi-car crash that took out fan favorites Martin Truex Jr. and Helio Castroneves and damaged several cars. Logano looked like he could have jumped immediately to the outside when the trouble started, but it happened awfully quickly.
And in typical Daytona fashion, the early incidents were just the warmup for what was to come. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. had a strong run with fewer than 20 to go, but he tried to throw a block that wasn’t there, and with nowhere to go, Logano had to try to get away as Stenhouse drove him even lower into the low line of cars.
And because cautions breed cautions, there was another one on the restart, and another crash coming to the checkers that probably should have been one.
Fans love superspeedway racing and all it entails.
However, this edition featured an airborne car, something that NASCAR hasn’t seemed to be able to prevent as cars get more aerodynamic. Once again, Ryan Preece was just along for the ride after a crash he didn’t create, and while this one was less spectacular than the dozen or so times he spun in the air in his last one, the landing was violent and while Preece walked away, he had a dark take.
"When the car took off like that, it got real quiet and all I thought about was my daughter." 🙏
— FOX: NASCAR (@NASCARONFOX) February 17, 2025
–@RyanPreece_ after a scary moment where his car flipped in the final laps of the #Daytona500 pic.twitter.com/4xGrNY22jX
And he’s not wrong. Safety in NASCAR has come a long way, but that doesn’t mean drivers can’t get hurt — or worse.
As it is, the Daytona 500, NASCAR’s biggest and most prestigious race, has become known as much, if not more, for its violent crashes as its exciting finishes and who’s who of winners. That doesn’t really earn the title for the Great American Race.
Why… should you be paying attention this week?
Besides the obvious — there’s a race next week as the season enters full swing—there are a couple of other things to keep an eye on this week.
First up, NASCAR filed for the reversal of a court injunction that allows 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports to race as chartered teams while their antitrust suit against NASCAR is ongoing. If that injunction is overturned, it will have major implications for the six chartered teams within those two organizations as starting positions and prize money are guaranteed by charters.
There’s also an intriguing tidbit floating around that a fourth manufacturer may be on the horizon for the Craftsman Truck Series. File that one away for future reference as renewed interest by manufacturers is a positive indicator about the health of the sport overall. It’s not confirmed by NASCAR as of yet, but it’s worth keeping on the radar.
"NASCAR has received a formal submission from a manufacturer aiming to join Chevrolet, Ford and Toyota in the [Truck] series next year. According to sources, Dodge is the leading candidate to return to the sport." – @Catchfence https://t.co/A0FzcUtbNJ
— Adam Stern (@A_S12) February 16, 2025
As for Atlanta, drivers to watch include Logano, Byron and Blaney. They have the current configuration figured out. Blaney’s 6.1 average finish tops the field by at least three spots. Daniel Suarez is also solid with a 12.1 average.
Like a dark horse pick? Keep an eye on AJ Allmendinger. He’s only got a couple of starts on the current Atlanta, but he’s been solid, finishing third in his most recent attempt.
How… did this race stack up?
It’s difficult to compare races at Daytona because the superspeedway package has changed so drastically that the way drivers race can’t really be compared.
Under the current package, this one was about par for the course: a bunch of big wrecks, including the inevitable one on the final lap.
The margin of victory was just .113 seconds, but that doesn’t tell the story this time. The third-place car was a full half second behind the frontrunners, and some drivers hesitated after the last-lap incident, perhaps expecting a caution flag.
The race had some redeeming qualities: 15 different leaders, Johnson’s finish, Justin Allgaier’s top 10 for owner Dale Earnhardt Jr. in JR Motorsports’ Cup debut among them.
The 2025 edition isn’t going to go down as a classic, so the number of the day? It’s the first time since 2022 that the race hasn’t ended under caution.
Amy is an 20-year veteran NASCAR writer and a six-time National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA) writing award winner, including first place awards for both columns and race coverage. As well as serving as Photo Editor, Amy writes The Big 6 (Mondays) after every NASCAR Cup Series race. She can also be found working on her bi-weekly columns Holding A Pretty Wheel (Tuesdays) and Only Yesterday (Wednesdays). A New Hampshire native whose heart is in North Carolina, Amy’s work credits have extended everywhere from driver Kenny Wallace’s website to Athlon Sports. She can also be heard weekly as a panelist on the Hard Left Turn podcast that can be found on AccessWDUN.com's Around the Track page.
I’m with Kyle Busch on this one. Logano needs to know how wide his car is. His fastest car on the track couldn’t be rammed into a hole not wide enough for it.
Bell got what he deserved . He got beside Hamlin and tried to stay beside him to control the speed and looked like he was on the brakes to stay there. The car behind would try to bump him to the front and he wouldn’t pass Hamlin. He didn’t have Mark Martin behind him.