In one of the wildest Daytona 500 final laps in recent memory, Tyler Reddick watched chaos and crashes pop up all around him. After a winless 2025 in the NASCAR Cup Series, the bad luck bug seemed primed to bite him again.
Instead? Reddick blew past it all, flooring it right to the front. He won Sunday’s (Feb. 15) Daytona 500, passing Chase Elliott on the last lap to score the victory.
The No. 45 Toyota driver led only one lap all day — the 200th — en route to the ninth victory of his Cup career.
The Spire Motorsports duo of Carson Hocevar and Michael McDowell led at the white flag, but both drivers spun going into turn 1, breaking up the pack. Elliott then pulled away down the backstretch with a push from Zane Smith, leaving the sport’s Most Popular Driver in the driver’s seat.
It didn’t last. Some well-timed help from 23XI Racing teammate Riley Herbst on the exit of turn 4 allowed Reddick to sneak by Elliott, who was turned in the tri-oval and slammed into the wall at the finish.
This time, it was everyone else around Reddick who couldn’t catch a break. He crossed the line to earn his first Daytona 500 trophy, the best-case scenario after a year filled with off-track distractions with a team lawsuit against NASCAR, bad luck on the racetrack and Reddick fighting through health issues with his young son, Rookie.
“Last year was really hard for all of us, hard for me,” Reddick told FOX Sports. “When you’re a [NASCAR Cup Series] driver and you get to this level and drive for Michael Jordan, it’s expected that you win every year. Just speechless.”
Said team co-owner Michael Jordan, who saw all three of his 23XI Racing cars finish inside the top 10: “It feels like I won a championship.”
Ricky Stenhouse Jr. pancaked the wall with Elliott’s turn 4 wreck but somehow crossed the line in second place. Joey Logano, Elliott, Brad Keselowski, Smith, Chris Buescher, Herbst, Josh Berry and Bubba Wallace completed the top 10.
Elliott came oh-so-close to his first 500 win.
“The 38 (Smith) and I had gotten out by ourselves down the back,” Elliott said. “He gave me a good shove off into [turn 3]. It was kinda just he and I. At that point, I felt momentum shift like there was going to be another run coming from behind us. Unfortunately, that was accurate. At that point in time, you’re just on defense.”
Wallace led a race-high 40 laps but couldn’t get back to the front after the final round of green flag pit stops.
“Man, I don’t know what to say,” Wallace said. “First of all, hats off to the No. 45 group. I don’t want my emotions to take away from the monumental day they just accomplished.
“I thought this was our week, the best 500 I’ve ever had, and to come up short, sucks. But couldn’t be more proud of the team. Led a lot of laps, lap leader, I believe. It was a good day for us, but damn. Try again next year.”
Another impressive driver was Keselowski, who finished inside the top five running his first race since breaking his femur in December. But a maiden Daytona 500 victory was not in the cards for him.
“Last restart, I gave William Byron a great push, and it just wasn’t enough to move our lane,” Keselowski said. “I was giving him all I had, and then right here at the end, I had this huge run and the 35 (Herbst) wrecked us. Really disappointed. Tore up the 9 (Elliott), tore up the 22 (Logano), a bunch of cars that didn’t deserve to be wrecked, so that was a big bummer and really stupid.
“Still a decent day for us to come home with a top five and to be competitive and have a shot to win.”
Perhaps the final true contender was Logano, who finally finished the race for the first time since 2023 but was unable to win it for the second time.
“Yeah, eventful day for sure,” Logano said. “Had a little damage from a wreck earlier. Made a good move there at the end, we got to the top and we were rolling and found myself racing for the lead. I had an opportunity to get underneath the Spire cars in the middle of 1 and 2, I felt like it was the right move, and I did it and put her out in the wind. I guess the damage was more than I thought because I just kind of slowed down and I couldn’t clear like I thought I was going to.”
The finish was in doubt until the very end, a typical Daytona race with the pack tightly wound together in between a number of big wrecks. Five cautions littered the race for 32 laps, three for contact.
The biggest incident of the race occurred on Lap 123, when Justin Allgaier threw a late block on Denny Hamlin in the tri-oval, leading to a crash that involved 17 cars. Allgaier, Todd Gilliland and Alex Bowman were ruled out of the race after the crash.
From there, the race looked poised to run to the finish under green. All the drivers but McDowell had actually completed green-flag pit stops headed to the final 20 miles. That’s when Christopher Bell and Denny Hamlin got into the wall with nine laps to go, bringing out another caution flag.
McDowell, who ran the final 67 laps without stopping for gas, then found himself in front and seemingly in position to win the race with teammate Hocevar blocking. It just didn’t work out, both drivers wiped out in the start of the last-lap fracas that defined the race.
The first wrecked car? That would be BJ McLeod, who completed only four laps before a mechanical issue led to him spinning on the exit of turn 4. McLeod was then ruled out of the race.
Smith won stage one, while Wallace won stage two.
Daytona 500 Results
The Cup Series will head to EchoPark Speedway for their second race of the season on Sunday, Feb. 21. Race coverage will begin at 3 p.m. ET on FOX, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
A member of the National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA), Samuel also covers NASCAR for Yardbarker, Field Level Media, and Heavy Sports. He will attend the University of Arkansas in the fall of 2025.
FOX needs to add a mute option to shut off the booth, and only broadcast the sounds of the race. Early wreck, Kevin Harvick correctly conveys the cause. The producer buzzes in his ear to let him know to cause drama by blaming Ross Chastain, even though every replay showed he had nothing to do with it. Sadly most of what race fans know is fed to them by the network who has the contract, who makes money by creating drama, where none exists. Maybe CNN should broadcast the races…
Well, I am sure that it has been much ballyhooed by many……but the Toyota team cars 3 wide running at 51% throttle for about 30 laps……How can that NOT be race manipulation??? How does NASCAR not contact all 3 crew chiefs to “crank it up” or risk getting black flagged?? That nonsense changed the complexion of the race, whether good or bad. After the Bowman Gray fiasco……..now, a Daytona fiasco. Ohh….we are in a race to the gutter.
How do you say Hocevar spun out when he got fenced?
These 51% throttle fuel mileage races have killed super speedway races for me.
Ditch the stages, 15 gallon fuel cells. It’s so simple.
And at the risk of being labeled…….the Three Stooges ( with all due respect to Moe, Larry and Curly ) in the Fox Booth continued their Bubba love/suck fest from last season. All throughout the aforementioned 30 laps of race manipulation, they couldn’t stop talking about how Bubba sees his child in the one million dollar Prevost bus and it calms him. Note to the 3 stooges: No one cares! Logano has a bunch of kids in his Prevost bus. You never hear the stooges talking about his family.
This type of racing is just all luck on superspeedways. The rules are ridiculous and its a wonder how no one has gotten seriously injured. NASCAR limits the drivers by keeping cars under the 200 number.The announcing is also bad. Talk about the lack of speed which racing is built around !