Tyler Reddick Wins the Daytona 500 (2-15-26)
By: Becca Cottingham Quimby
All Photo Credit: NASCAR On Fox
We kick off the Daytona 500 with forty-one cars to a sold-out crowd. They had a moment of silence on lap three in honor of Dale Earnhardt. People in the stands are on their feet holding up the number three. Shortly after we get our first caution as BJ Mcloud goes around due to a tire issue. During this caution everyone except for Kyle Busch for at least a splash of gas. Making Kyle Busch the only person on a completely different strategy than everyone else. Everyone except for BJ Mcloud was able to get back on track and make track speed. Multiple cars in the Daytona 500 are utilizing the same font that Greg Biffle used in his honor. All of the cars from RFK and A.J. Allmendinger went with this font. Denny Hamlin has his Dad’s name on his car today in his honor as well. Kyle Busch’s car broke loose and he got into Brad Keselowski. What could have been the start of an accident, Brad had some great heads-up driving. Most teams waited until the last moment to hit pit road to get fuel. Jimmie Johnson spun onto pit road. William Byron also had issues with getting into the wall. However, we had a few teams that honestly stretched their fuel beyond what most teams thought they would be able to achieve. Zane Smith will win stage one followed by team Penseke.
We head into stage two where we have another sixty-five laps to get through. Ty Gibbs will have to start at the rear as he pitted outside his box. Several cars decided to come down pit road after it closed which will have to go to the rear single file. We see our second accident where there was a stack up. Austin Dillion went down to avoid the accident but due to the smoke was not able to see and made additional contact with Chase Briscoe. Chase led several laps in stage one and went to the garage for repairs after the accident. Austin Dillion also went to the garage for repairs. This will also open pit road for everyone to make it to the end of the stage. With everyone able to make it, all drivers are not holding back during this time. Coming down to the last ten laps we have roughly seventeen cars involved in an accident. This will lead us to the end of stage two under caution. Bubba Wallace will win stage two, while multiple cars will not return for stage three.
We head back to racing for the final stage which is sure to bring additional drama. The Toyotas took up the front row and for most of the three-by-three paced race. Drivers started hitting pit road around lap twenty to get fuel to make it to the end of the race. The issues that we are seeing with the small group that was pitted are that they got spread out. This caused a draft issue coming off the pit road. Cole Custer ran out of gas and fell backwards through the pack but made it to pit road for fuel. The groups of four cars are not working as well when it comes to the draft as it is taking multiple laps to get to the lead pack. As cars are dancing everywhere trying to gain the best place in traffic. Michael McDowell stayed out and was the last car that had not pitted. There was an issue with a push gone wrong that resulted in Denny Hamlin getting into Christopher Bell. With less than six laps to go at the top of caution, this will lead to some interesting racing when we go back green. We had not one but two wrecks on the last lap one of which happened at the finish line. Tyler Reddick with some strategic and great driving on the last lap is what sealed the win for him
