Two days before the NASCAR Cup Series’ regular-season finale at Daytona International Speedway, the rules of engagement changed.
On Wednesday, it was believed that 15 full-time drivers would be racing their hearts out for the one and only available playoff spot available in the 16-driver field. Ryan Blaney was the driver occupying the spot, with a 25-point advantage over 2017 Cup Series champion Martin Truex Jr.
No other driver had a mathematical shot of getting into the playoffs on points.
Someone was either going to win their way into the playoffs, or Blaney or Truex would find themselves in the 16th spot at the end of Saturday night.
Then Kurt Busch, still recovering from a concussion, announced Thursday he was withdrawing from the playoffs.
Busch To Miss The Start Of NASCAR Playoffs
Now, Blaney and Truex are above the cutline.
Blaney won this race last year and finished fourth in the Daytona 500 in February after contact with teammate Austin Cindric coming to the checkered flag resulted in him wrecking across the start-finish line.
Truex, on the other hand, has never won a superspeedway race in the Cup Series. However, he did win both stages in this year’s Daytona 500 before he finished 13th.
“Daytona is interesting. It hasn’t been one of my better tracks, but I really enjoy going there,” Truex said in a release. “To me, the strategy at Daytona is to just try to stay up front as much as possible or as close to the front as you can and hope that when the big crash happens, it’s behind you. That’s really the strategy; the only strategy is to try to stay up front. For us, as much of a wild card race as this is, I think we’ll have a good shot at winning and it’d be a great time to get our first superspeedway win with everything on the line. It’d be quite a story.”
Blaney and Truex’s situation leaves 13 drivers behind them who still can’t get in on points and have to win their way in.
They are:
- Erik Jones
- Aric Almirola
- Austin Dillon
- Bubba Wallace
- Chris Buescher
- Justin Haley
- Michael McDowell
- Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
- Cole Custer
- Brad Keselowski
- Harrison Burton
- Ty Dillon
- Todd Gilliland
It’s safe to say that there are a lot of threats in the group of 13.
With Jones, Almirola, Dillon, McDowell, Haley, Stenhouse and Keselowski, they combine to have seven points wins in Cup Series races at Daytona. Though, Almirola’s (July 2014) and Haley’s (July 2019) came in races that were shortened by rain.
However, Almirola has also won at Talladega (Ala.) Superspedway and Haley has two NASCAR Xfinity Series wins each at Daytona and Talladega.
“Daytona has always been a great track for me,” Haley said in a media release. “Having a good team, strategy and spotter are vital. Everything just needs to sync up to be able to pull off a win at Daytona.”
Jones, driver of Petty GMS Motorsports’ No. 43 Chevrolet, won the summer Daytona race in 2018 for his first career Cup victory. Earlier this year, Jones was leading the field coming to the checkered flag at Talladega.
Unfortunately for him, he had too big of a lead over the cars behind him and was swarmed in the tri-oval, resulting in a Ross Chastain victory.
“I know we can go do it, I know we can run well there, and I know we can have a shot to win,” Jones said in a release. “We just have to execute and hope we’re staying out of trouble and avoid a lot of the chaos and be up there and have a shot. We’ll see. It’s going to be tough for sure to just be there at the end to have a chance, but I feel good about our speed we’re going to have for sure.”
Austin Dillon enters Saturday night looking to add to his win in the 2017 Daytona 500, a result of Dillon shooting to the lead on the final lap after contact sent Almirola into the outside wall.
In the wake of his 500 win, Dillon has only finished in the top five once at Daytona, a third-place result in the 2021 season-opener.
“It’s tough. It’s a game of putting yourself in position,” Dillon said in a release. “I call it high-speed chess because you know at some point in time you’re going to be vulnerable. You hope that someone doesn’t take advantage of that too much and cause a big wreck. It’s one of those things where you are constantly moving and trying to guess the flow of the pack. I think the best place to be is in the front most of the time, but it’s impossible now with the way we race to keep yourself up there for the entire race. You see guys do it for long periods of time. Denny Hamlin has been pretty amazing at putting himself in the right position as of late. I’m going to do my best this time around to put ourselves in position.”
For Stenhouse, winner of the 2017 July race at Daytona and a race at Talladega, he has “unfinished business” at the 2-mile track following this year’s Daytona 500.
“We were able to lead (16 laps in) the Daytona 500 and with six laps to go, we were battling for the win until we got wrecked,” said Stenhouse, who finished 28th that day. “We still have something to finish there.”
Keselowski’s sole Daytona win came in the 2016 summer race.
The RFK Racing driver / co-owner had one of the fastest cars in February, winning his qualifying race and leading 67 laps in the Daytona 500. But he was involved in multiple incidents in the race, including the one that took out Stenhouse. He wound up with a ninth-place finish, his best Daytona result since his 2016 victory.
“It goes without saying but this race is going to be wild,” Keselowski said in a release. “I told the team that if I can be one of the last 10 cars left on the last restart, we’ll have a shot and that’s about all you can ask for, especially in this type of scenario. We know we have speed and feel really good about our chances, we just need everything to align to make it happen.”
Arguably the biggest threat among the 13 who has never won at Daytona is Wallace.
The 23XI Racing driver finished second in the Daytona 500 for the second time this year, finishing by .036 seconds to Austin Cindric with the right-front fender missing from his No. 23 Toyota.
Since 2020, Wallace had finished in the top five three times at Daytona, including runner-up finishes in the last two races. That’s in addition to his win in the October 2021 race at Talladega.