{"id":155818,"date":"2026-02-14T21:32:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-14T21:32:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/155818\/"},"modified":"2026-02-14T21:32:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T21:32:11","slug":"daytona-500-start-time-moved-because-of-weather","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/155818\/","title":{"rendered":"Daytona 500 start time moved because of weather"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Daytona 500\u2019s start time will move up an hour, to 1:30 p.m. Sunday because of inclement weather expected to reach Florida\u2019s Surf Coast later in the day.<\/p>\n

NASCAR announced the change a year after William Byron won<\/a> a weather-delayed race that took nearly eight hours to complete.\u00a0Only twice since 2019 has the race run as scheduled, in 2022 and 2023.<\/p>\n

The delays can heavily impact TV ratings.<\/p>\n

The 2025 race drew a reported 6.761 viewers, up 13% from 5.3 million in 2024 when nearly six millions watched Byron win on Monday after a Sunday rainout. Michael McDowell\u2019s 2021 win drew only 4.908 million viewers after weather led to a finish after midnight.<\/p>\n

On Sunday, gates and hospitality will now open at 9 a.m., and the Hard Rock Bet Fanzone will open at 8:30 a.m.. Parking lots will open at 6 a.m.<\/p>\n

A sellout crowd will still be treated to a pre-race performance by Miranda Lambert and the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds flyover at the conclusion of the National Anthem.<\/p>\n

The 41-car field will be led by first-time Daytona 500 pole-sitter Kyle Busch in Row 1 with Chase Briscoe, who won the pole in 2025.<\/p>\n

Broadcast networks remain unchanged. The race will be live on Fox, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.<\/p>\n

Edgar Thompson can be reached at egthompson@orlandosentinel.com<\/a>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Daytona 500\u2019s start time will move up an hour, to 1:30 p.m. Sunday because of inclement weather…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":155819,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[3160,28,47257,115,139,141,140,110,2261,221],"class_list":{"0":"post-155818","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-orlando","8":"tag-daytona-beach","9":"tag-florida","10":"tag-motorsports","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-orlando","13":"tag-orlando-headlines","14":"tag-orlando-news","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-volusia-county","17":"tag-weather"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155818","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=155818"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155818\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/155819"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=155818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=155818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=155818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}