William Byron wins the Daytona 500 for the second straight year

William Byron knows he took advantage of some fortune to win another Daytona 500.

“Just trusted my instincts on the last lap there,” said Byron, who drives the No. 24 Chevrolet for powerhouse Hendrick Motorsports. “I felt like they were getting squirrelly on the bottom, and I was honestly going to go third lane regardless because I was probably sixth coming down the back.”

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Byron became the fifth driver to win back-to-back Daytona 500s and the first since Denny Hamlin in 2019-20.

Byron avoided a last-lap crash by racing near the outside wall and went on to win “The Great American Race.”

“Just obviously fortunate that it worked out in our favor,” he said. “Crazy. I can’t honestly believe that. But we’re here. So proud of it.”

Kyle Busch didn’t mince words while blaming Joey Logano for a late-race crash in the Daytona 500.

Busch finished 34th in the race, one spot ahead of Logano. Both were caught up in a wreck that Logano seemed to cause.

“Looks like the fastest car got in a hurry to get to the wreck,” Busch said. “Logano was by far the fastest car today. Saw a lot of laps lead and could about do anything; the Penske cars were very strong. We still go 20 laps to go and he’s trying to go through the middle and make a hole that isn’t there and created chaos. … You got to know how wide your racecar is to be able to find a hole that it’ll fit in, and he obviously doesn’t know that.”

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William Byron has won the Daytona 500 for the second time in as many years.

Byron took advantage of several late cautions to get to the front and became the first back-to-back winner in “The Great American Race” since Denny Hamlin in 2019-20. Tyler Reddick finished second, and Jimmie Johnson third.

Kyle Larson was one of the drivers involved in a late crash that brought a third red flag to the Daytona 500.

Larson’s Chevrolet was hit in back in the crash that saw Ryan Preece go airborne.

Crew chief Cliff Daniels says they will need to make two pit stops.

Ryan Preece turned upside-down at Daytona International Speedway for the second time in two years.

Preece got caught in a late crash in the Daytona 500 and essentially did a wheelie in his No. 60 Ford. His car flipped onto its roof and turned back onto its tires before hitting the outside wall. Preece dropped his safety net to signal to crews he was OK.

“When the car took off like that ... all I thought about was my daughter, so I’m lucky to walk away,” he said after the crash.

His harrowing, flipping crash in the summer race at Daytona in 2023 caused the track to replace grass with asphalt on the backstretch.

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Former series champions Joey Logano, Kyle Busch, Ryan Blaney and Chase Elliott were involved in a late crash in the Daytona 500.

Logano and Ricky Stenhouse started the eight-car melee with 15 laps to go when Stenhouse moved to block Logano in the middle lane. It stacked up Logano, and the accordion effect sent several cars sliding in every direction.

Busch’s car ended up on a wrecker, extending his skid to 0 for 20 in “The Great American Race.”

Kyle Larson is frustrated as he’s stuck in traffic and blaming himself.

“I make all wrong moves. Any move I make is the wrong one,” he said on his radio.

Crew chief Cliff Daniels wasn’t hearing it and launched into a lengthy motivational speech. He reminded Larson that he’d just avoided a multicar crash and as the laps are winding down, Larson has time to get to the front.

“You missed the wreck. If they wreck again you will miss it,” Daniels said. “Whatever you think you are doing wrong you can work on it. It’s only going to take one or two moves to make something happen. It’s not an if, it’s a when.”

Seven-time NASCAR champion Jimmie Johnson lost 25 spots on pit road late in the race, delivering a crushing blow to his chances of winning a third Daytona 500.

Blocked in his pit by a fellow driver, Johnson had to back up his No. 84 Toyota and drive around — a move that cost him precious seconds and a bunch of spots.

It’s not an impossible hole to recover from, but it leaves Johnson with plenty of work to do and very little time to get it done.

Johnson entered the pits in eighth and left in 33rd.

Once Helio Castroneves crashed out of the Daytona 500, Trackhouse Racing quickly packed up its pit stall. That opened a trackside viewing space for spectators who held pit passes.

About two dozen people crammed into the pit stall next to Kyle Larson to watch the finish of the race.

Cliff Daniels gave a pep talk to the No. 5 crew ahead of Larson’s two-tires and fuel stop.

“Just be clean,” he said, and he’d be fine if the stop was a half-second slower if it meant it would be mistake free.

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Ryan Blaney won the second stage of the Daytona 500, another small victory for Ford.

Blaney edged Team Penske teammate Austin Cindric on the final lap of the segment. It was a 1-2 finish for Ford, which also won the opening stage behind Joey Logano’s early race dominance.

Cindric led 37 of the 65 laps in the second stage in his No. 2 Ford. But Blaney got by him just before the start-finish line. Twelve cars have led the race, with six of those being Fords.

Chase Elliott was third in a Chevrolet, followed by Hendrick Motorsports teammate Alex Bowman.

At the end of the second stage, crew chief Cliff Daniels urged Kyle Larson to be patient as Larson struggles to get his Chevrolet through traffic.

“I know you are frustrated,” Daniels said.

Larson said his car “just gets stuck” in the pack and can’t move forward the way his Hendrick Motorsports teammates have been able to do in the Daytona 500.

Four-time Indianapolis 500 champion Helio Castroneves’ rough NASCAR debut ended when he was caught up in a massive wreck and forced out of the Daytona 500 after 70 laps.

Castroneves raced in the Daytona 500 as a special 41st driver under a new rule that allows for a “world-class driver” to receive a provisional spot.

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His No. 91 Chevrolet crashed in one of the Daytona 500 qualifying races, forcing his car to get rebuilt for Sunday’s race. He was also wrecked twice in NASCAR’s low-level ARCA race, but rebounded for a top-five finish, only to get wrecked into the infield after the race.

Castroneves landed a NASCAR ride as part of Trackhouse’s “Project 91,” designed to give renowned racers from outside of the series a shot in a stock car.

AJ Allmendinger, Martin Truex Jr. and Ross Chastain also are out of the race.

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Joey Logano’s crew frantically swapped out an electronic control unit while the field was under caution. The scramble came after Logano’s No. 22 Ford failed to take off during a restart and caused a seven-car wreck.

Logano radioed to his crew, “It’s still not right” after the parts change.

Logano is the defending Cup Series champion and had been considered one of the favorites to win “The Great American Race.”

The 2015 Daytona 500 champ won the opening stage of Sunday’s race and led 43 of the first 72 laps.

Ross Chastain, Helio Castroneves, Kyle Busch, Jimmie Johnson and Martin Truex Jr. were involved in the first big one of the Daytona 500.

The seven-car wreck started when Joey Logano’s No. 22 Ford failed to get up to speed on a Lap 72 restart. Cars behind him stacked up, leading John Hunter Nemechek to turn Chastain’s No. 1 Chevrolet. Chastain slammed into the outside wall and collected several others.

Busch, Johnson and Truex are former series champions. Castroneves is a four-time Indianapolis 500 winner making his NASCAR debut.

Kyle Larson’s crew chief Cliff Daniels is a tire catcher during a four-tire stop. Daniels also uses the time to get a close look at the No. 5 Chevrolet and check the tire wear.

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Joey Logano won the opening stage of the Daytona 500.

Logano led 38 of the 65 laps in the stage in his No. 22 Ford. The manufacturer claimed the top three spots, with Brad Keselowski second and Ryan Blaney third. Logano and Blaney drive for powerhouse Team Penske.

Logano won the 2015 Daytona 500 and is the defending Cup Series champion.

Much of the opening stage was three-wide racing, a product of driving in cooler temperatures that create less-slippery conditions on the 2 1/2-mile speedway.

AJ Allmendinger was the first of 41 drivers out of the race. Zane Smith and Josh Berry were involved in a late-stage crash that forced the 65-lap segment to end under caution.

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Gene Haas, owner of the Haas Formula 1 team and the Haas Factory NASCAR team, is at the Daytona 500.

Haas and Tony Stewart shuttered four-car Stewart-Haas Racing at the end of last season, but Haas is fielding one Ford in NASCAR this year with Cole Custer as the driver.

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Zane Smith and Josh Berry were involved in the first accident of the Daytona 500.

Berry, driving for the famed Wood Brothers Racing team, hit the wall on Lap 63 and did some fairly significant damage to his No. 21 Ford.

Austin Cindric and Denny Hamlin avoided the crash.

AJ Allmendinger could be the first driver out of the Daytona 500.

Allmendinger reports engine trouble, and his No. 16 Chevrolet team says there’s smoke coming out his tailpipe. Allmendinger drove to the pits in hopes of finding a diagnosis, but he lost several laps in the process and ended up in the garage for further work.

Corey LaJoie, who so badly wanted to race in the Daytona 500 that he gambled his children’s college fund to secure a seat, led three laps in the opening stage.

LaJoie was let go last season from Spire Motorsports and closed out the year driving the final six races with Rick Ware Racing with no promise of 2025 work. Ware was willing to field a second car at Daytona International Speedway, but it would be a driver who brought the financial funding for the effort.

LaJoie, who has welcomed three sons since 2020, grabbed their college fund and turned it over to Ware to make sure another driver wouldn’t snag the No. 01 Ford before he could find sponsorship.

Although he ultimately found a sponsor and got his money back, it’s looking like a promising payoff.

The Daytona 500 has resumed after roughly 3 1/2 hours of weather delays.

The first delay was 3 hours, 9 minutes and 59 seconds. The latest delay was 20 minutes, 40 seconds.

Joey Logano took the green flag as the race resumed on Lap 24.

The Daytona 500 is back under a yellow, caution flag.

The second red flag for rain officially lasted 20 minutes, 40 seconds. NASCAR says the rain is over, and the race will resume shortly and will conclude tonight.

The popular floating airship was noticeably absent during pre-race activities, and Goodyear officials said winds reached 45 mph about a thousand feet above ground and thus made a decision “for safety’s sake to stand down, let the weather roll through.”

Now that the weather has mostly cleared, the blimp posted a message on social media that it’s en route to the track to help provide aerial views of “The Great American Race.”

The blimp is celebrating its 100th anniversary.

The public address system is playing “Here Comes The Rain Again” by Annie Lennox as the cars are being covered on pit road for the second rain stoppage of the Daytona 500.

NASCAR has thrown the red flag again for rain. Drivers were ordered back to pit road with more rain on the way.

Drivers will stay in their cars while the rain passes.

The Daytona 500 has already been delayed more than three hours due to rain.

The Daytona 500 is now under a yellow caution flag after a 3 hour, 9 minute rain delay.

The cars will turn several laps under caution before the race resumes under green-flag conditions.

The ambient temperature has dropped more than 20 degrees since the race was halted for rain. It should provide drivers with more grip and racier conditions as the 500-mile NASCAR race resumes.

There is another weather cell on the radar, although it doesn’t appear to be enough to prevent the event from finishing Sunday under the lights.

Kyle Larson is told by crew chief Cliff Daniels that they will have him come to pit road for a service stop once the race resumes.

Teams cannot work on cars during stoppages and Daniels wants to fill the car with fuel and potentially change tires.

NASCAR driver A.J. Allmendinger experienced an interesting weather delay at the Daytona 500. He didn’t eat. He didn’t sleep. But he still found some in-house entertainment.

“I pretty much watched all my pit crew guys mow through all the food in my fridge,” Allmendinger said just before the race resumed following a three-hour break.

NASCAR has called for the drivers to return to their cars at 5:25 p.m. in an attempt to restart the Daytona 500 following a lengthy rain delay.

Trump spoke to reporters after he landed back in West Palm Beach.

He left the race during what he said was “a little rain delay, but we’ll go home and watch it, I guess.”

Fox Sports has cut away from its Daytona 500 coverage during a rain delay as the network waits through a rain delay.

Fox switched to a replay of last year’s Daytona 500, which William Byron won.

The same thing happened in 2014, when Fox aired the previous year’s race during a weather delay. Jimmie Johnson won in 2013, and as the replay concluded, his phone started lighting up with congratulatory messages from friends and family — and got scores of social media notifications.

Current NASCAR analyst Clint Bowyer, who was driving at the time, even posted a congrats message to Johnson on social media.

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Cease production of the penny, let collectors gobble up what’s left of the 1-cent coin, and there will still be one eternally glued to Dale Earnhardt’s old Chevrolet, the luckiest piece of loose change in NASCAR history.

The penny may have been doomed into obscurity after President Trump directed the Treasury Department to stop minting new ones, citing the rising cost of producing the coin.

The memories that linger of Earnhardt, 24 years after his death in the 2001 Daytona 500, and of the penny given to him by a 6-year-old girl ahead of his 1998 Daytona 500 victory, are priceless to those who were there for one of NASCAR’s seminal moments.

“I know,” Earnhardt crew chief Larry McReynolds said this week, when asked if he heard of the penny’s impending demise, “the ’98 lucky penny.”

▶ Read more about the lucky penny

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The Rizzler is hanging out at Daytona International Speedway.

The 8-year-old social media influencer, who gained fame by squinting his eyes, pursing his lips and stroking his chin as part of the “rizz face,” was spotted in the garage with driver Noah Gragson during a Daytona 500 rain delay.

The Rizzler, whose real name is Christian Joseph, has 1 million followers on Instagram and 1.5 million on TikTok.

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The Goodyear Blimp has so far been grounded for the Daytona 500.

The popular floating airship was noticeably absent during pre-race activities, and Goodyear officials said winds reached 45 mph about a thousand feet above ground and thus made a decision “for safety’s sake to stand down, let the weather roll through.”

Goodyear expects the blimp to be overhead when the race resumes, hopefully in several hours.

Kyle Larson stopped at the Fox Sports stage during the rain delay at the Daytona 500 before heading to his motorhome to wait out the delay.

Larson said he expects fuel saving to be important, and noted that passing seemed difficult the first eight laps. Part of his strategy for when the race resumes, he said, will be “cross your fingers and hope you don’t crash.”

AccuWeather is warning that wind gusts of up to 40 mph are headed toward Daytona International Speedway.

The weather service said the “gusty winds could knock down tree limbs and blow around unsecured objects. Those attending the Daytona 500 are in the path of these showers and should prepare for gusty winds, rain and the potential for a few lightning strikes.”

The Daytona 500 has a recent history of rain issues.

“The Great American Race” was delayed Sunday for the sixth time in the last 14 years, a troubling trend for NASCAR. Heavy rain and wind up to 40 mph was forecast in the afternoon, and since the 2 1/2-mile speedway takes at least two hours to dry, drivers, crews and spectators braced for a long day.

The season opener and the biggest race on the Cup Series schedule annually has been postponed to Monday three times: 2012, 2020 and last year. It also was delayed 6 hours, 22 minutes in 2014 and 5 hours, 40 minutes in 2021.

The president’s motorcade rolled away from the speedway after the race was halted because of a heavy downpour.

Trump is returning to the airport for the flight on Air Force One back to his home in Palm Beach, Florida, where he’s staying for the weekend.

Larson crew chief Cliff Daniels has headed back to the Hendrick Motorsports hauler during the rain delay.

Larson is sitting on the pit box. The team radio is silent.

Drivers are out of their cars at the Daytona 500, which has been stopped after 11 laps for rain that is expected to cause a lengthy delay.

It takes about two hours to dry the track once rain stops.

The drivers typically return to their motorhomes to wait out a delay.

Some stop by the Fox Sports desk to do a live television interview to fill the air time. Ty Gibbs of Joe Gibbs Racing was the first driver to get to the Fox set.