Daytona in summertime. There’s a reason why the Coke Zero Sugar 400 started at 10 a.m. ET until 1989.
Daytona is hot and humid every day this time of year. It is inadvisable to keep yourself out in broad daylight for too long. Otherwise, you could get dizzy. I found that out the hard way when interviewing Ricky Carmichael for Frontstretch back in 2011.
While I have not covered NASCAR in Daytona since the summer race was moved to August, I have covered six Coke Zero Sugar 400s for the site (2010-2015). Of those six, three of them were affected by rain.
The 2010 race was delayed for over two hours at the start due to rain. The 2014 race was fully postponed to noon ET the next day, then had a rain delay in the first 10 laps and was eventually rain-shortened. Finally, the 2015 race started at 11:45 p.m. ET and ended at 2:40 a.m. ET with Austin Dillon in the catchfence.
That race was already scheduled as a Sunday night race post-holiday due to NBC not wanting to pre-empt firework display broadcasts. A mandatory Tuesday test at Kentucky Speedway, which had just been re-configured, meant that NASCAR had to get the race in Sunday night.
More recently, the 2022 race was postponed to 10 a.m. ET Sunday morning and moved to CNBC. What happened on lap 140 that day ultimately triggered a three-hour delay.
The 2019 race was also postponed to Sunday due to rain. That race ended up being red-flagged with 33 laps to go due to lightning. When the rains returned, that gave the win to Justin Haley.
The Xfinity Series race has been affected by rain four times in the last decade. That includes two postponements.
Needless to say, rain has been an issue at Daytona in recent years. In the past, this was a three-day race weekend that started on Thursday. They would have struggled to get on-track Thursday if that were the case this year.
Therein lies the rub. Daytona Beach in summer is prone to late afternoon thunderstorms that can wreak havoc on a race schedule. It can be sunny and perfectly fine at 2:30 p.m. ET, then the heavy rains roll in and everything stops for hours. If it happens, your schedule’s ruined.
Heck, even if it doesn’t rain at the track, it could be chaotic just getting there. There have been many times where thunderstorms that never move over the track sit over the pine barrens west of the track and produce blinding rain on Interstate 4 that all but halts traffic.
Forecast-wise, Friday’s forecast is for a mix of sun and clouds with a 55% chance of thunderstorms. The high temperature will be in the upper 80s, but it will feel much hotter than that.
Saturday is more of the same with a high chance of thunderstorms. High temperatures are likely to be around 85°. Since both the Cup and Xfinity races will be at night, temperatures will be lower than these high temperatures at race time …whenever that ends up being.
Phil Allaway has three primary roles at Frontstretch. He's the manager of the site's FREE e-mail newsletter that publishes Monday-Friday and occasionally on weekends. He keeps TV broadcasters honest with weekly editions of Couch Potato Tuesday and serves as the site's Sports Car racing editor.
Outside of Frontstretch, Phil is the press officer for Lebanon Valley Speedway in West Lebanon, N.Y. He covers all the action on the high-banked dirt track from regular DIRTcar Modified racing to occasional visits from touring series such as the Super DIRTcar Series.