There is a certain unmistakable drive that characterizes the Daytona International Speedway which both kickstarts the NASCAR Cup Series season and then months later, serve as the regular season finale to decide which 16 of sport\u2019s most worthy will now run for the season championship.<\/p>\n
This Saturday night\u2019s Coke Zero Sugar 400 (7:30 p.m. ET on NBC, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) marks the pivotal season marker for those racers hoping to hoist a championship trophy.<\/p>\n
So much is on the line Saturday night at the sport\u2019s most famous 2.5-mile high banks. And that\u2019s what makes this race unfailingly exceptional.<\/p>\n
Joe Gibbs Racing driver Denny Hamlin has admirably claimed the No. 1 seed in the Chase in what will long be considered one of the most determined and amazing title efforts in recent memory. Months ago, the driver of the No. 11 JGR Toyota had a more than 100-point deficit to early-season championship leader, 23XI Racing\u2019s Tyler Reddick, but Hamlin \u2013 a four-race winner \u2013 now comes to Daytona with a remarkable 77-point advantage on the entire field. The DAYTONA 500 winner Reddick ranked fourth.<\/p>\n
Beyond Hamlin in the standings, however, there is plenty of potential for movement \u2013 both in swapping positions inside the heart of the Chase lineup \u2013 and absolutely with the final two positions still very much left to be settled.<\/p>\n
There is something for everyone \u2013 reason for fans to hold their breath and reasons for them to exhale and cheer loudly. All in the form of high-stakes high-banks, high-drama that Daytona inevitably delivers.<\/p>\n
Team Penske\u2019s Austin Cindric and Trackhouse Racing\u2019s Shane Van Gisbergen are in the 15th and 16th positions in the standings heading into the race. Cindric, the 2022 DAYTONA 500 winner, is 44 points up on 17th place, Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing\u2019s Ryan Preece. And Van Gisbergen holds a tenuous 31-point lead on Preece, who cut that advantage nearly in half with a top-10 run at New Hampshire last week.<\/p>\n
Cindric has to be encouraged by his work at Daytona, claiming that career-defining win in the 2022 DAYTONA 500. The 27-year-old has led laps in seven of his 10 career Daytona starts, including four of the last five. His eighth-place finish in 2025\u2019s DAYTONA 500 was the only top-10 he\u2019s had, however, in the last seven races here.<\/p>\n
Cindric\u2019s third-place showing at Richmond, Va. two weeks ago is the only top-10 he\u2019s earned in the last 13 races of this season.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf it was up to me, I know exactly what I would want to do,\u201d\u2019 Cindric said of the weekend\u2019s race strategy, \u201cI\u2019m the guy who begged my crew chief to let me race after being on the front row in the DAYTONA 500, but, obviously, there\u2019s a lot at play for the race and a lot of factors to come in.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think qualifying will probably play a factor in some of those decisions, maybe, and maybe some of those decisions have already been made and I just haven\u2019t been informed yet.\u201d<\/p>\n
The 37-year-old former multi-time Australian Supercars Series champion Shane Van Gisbergen has been raising his game in recent weeks, in particular. More accustomed to road racing, he\u2019s steadily qualifying better on the ovals and has a pair of top-10 finishes this year at EchoPark Speedway (Atlanta), which races like the superspeedways in Daytona and Talladega. He\u2019s led nine laps at Daytona, but doesn\u2019t yet have a top-10 finish in his four career starts there.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s really hard to know, it\u2019s such an unknown track,\u201d Van Gisbergen said of the team\u2019s approach. \u201cIt\u2019s typical Daytona, but also the rule package change as well. Just a lot of unknown. Would have loved to leave New Hampshire last weekend with more of a cushion of course, like we entered with.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut being in season long championships all my life, it\u2019s a cool feeling knowing that we have a shot at making The Chase,\u201d he added. \u201cIt\u2019s a cool pressure to feel.\u201d<\/p>\n
As for Preece, the 35-year-old RFK racer has three top-10s and a top-five in 13 Daytona starts, his best showings of sixth place and fourth place came in the 2021 set of races. He\u2019s led 10 laps in the seven races since, his only top-20 finish \u2013 14th in the No. 60 RFK Racing Ford in this race last year.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom a points perspective, we have a chance, a Hail-Mary chance, but for the Owner\u2019s Chase we have a real chance so we\u2019re going to race hard next week,\u201d Preece said.<\/p>\n
The intensely tight margins are indicative of many positions well above the cutoff line. Other than Hamlin\u2019s established work leading the championships, there could be significant movement in the standings.<\/p>\n
Team Penske\u2019s Ryan Blaney is 44-points up on JGR\u2019s Ty Gibbs for second place. JGR\u2019s Christopher Bell holds an 11-point edge on his teammate Chase Briscoe for fifth place and is only 20 points ahead of reigning series champion, Kyle Larson who is in seventh place just a mere 1-point ahead of his Hendrick teammate Chase Elliott in eighth.<\/p>\n
Ninth place, Penske\u2019s Joey Logano holds a slight six-point edge over RFK\u2019s Chris Buescher and is only 10 points up on Spire Motorsports\u2019 Carson Hocevar.<\/p>\n
Hendrick\u2019s William Byron is ranked 12th, but only six points ahead of Spire\u2019s Daniel Suarez.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Half of the top 14 drivers in the championship are past Daytona winners \u2013 many with top-shelf resumes. Hamlin has won three Daytona 500s. Byron has won two Daytona 500s and a Coke Zero Sugar 400. Blaney is a two-time winner on the high banks and the defending winner in Saturday\u2019s 400-miler.<\/p>\n
Reddick (2026), Cindric (2022), Logano (2015) have won Daytona 500s. Buescher won the 2023 summer 400-miler.<\/p>\n
There will be no practice this week. Busch Light Pole Qualifying is set for Friday at 5 p.m. ET (truTv, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). Blaney won from pole position in this race last year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There is a certain unmistakable drive that characterizes the Daytona International Speedway which both kickstarts the NASCAR Cup…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":874382,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[446],"tags":[49,48,634,82],"class_list":["post-874381","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nascar","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nascar","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/874381","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=874381"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/874381\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/874382"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=874381"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=874381"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=874381"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}