Joey Logano and hometown favorite Chase Elliott won 150-mile qualifying races Thursday night to set the starting grid for Daytona on Sunday. Elliott will be joined on the oval by fellow Georgian Corey Heim of Marietta, who qualified on Wednesday.
NASCAR’s Super Bowl
William Byron will try to become the first driver in history to win the Daytona 500 three consecutive years when the 68th running of “The Great American Race” opens the NASCAR season on February 15.
Byron won last year’s event in overtime after race leader Denny Hamlin got spun on the final lap, igniting a multicar crash. Byron ended up passing eight cars on the last lap to return to victory lane.
Can he make it three in a row? Four others — Richard Petty in 1975, Cale Yarborough in 1985, Sterling Marlin in 1996 and Hamlin in 2021 — came up short in threepeat bids at NASCAR’s signature race.
The field includes seven other previous Daytona 500 winners, most notably three-time winner Hamlin and seven-time NASCAR champion Jimmie Johnson. Hamlin is trying to bounce back from a heartbreaking loss in the 2025 season finale and the December death of his father. Johnson, meanwhile, is again driving the No. 84 Toyota for his team, Legacy Motor Club.
This will be the first non-exhibition race since NASCAR and two teams — 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports — settled a federal antitrust lawsuit that threatened the series. The outcome guaranteed permanent charters for 36 teams.
The offseason also included the death of retired driver Greg Biffle, who was among seven people killed when his plane crashed in North Carolina just a week before Christmas.
How to watch the Daytona 500
The race will be aired on Fox. The green flag is set to drop at 2:30 p.m. Eastern on Sunday, weather permitting. Forecasts call for a chance of rain that could cause the race to be delayed.
The race will be streamed on the Fox One and the Fox Sports app.
