By JENNA FRYER AP Auto Racing Writer
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — The goal was obvious to William Byron: put the No. 24 Chevrolet in victory lane in the 2024 Daytona 500 to launch Hendrick Motorsports’ 40th anniversary season.
Mission accomplished, even if Byron had to complete an agonizing final lap under caution around Daytona International Speedway awaiting the winner to be declared.
“Did we win it? Did we win it?” Byron kept asking over his radio.
The emotion he heard over his radio from crew chief Rudy Fugle confirmed Byon had just won the biggest race of his career.
“Well, no one told me. And Rudy was crying on the radio, so I was like ‘Dude, I hope he’s crying for good reason,’” Byron said. “I guess he was a ball of emotion there, and so I was like ‘Did we actually win or not?’”
Byron snapped Hendrick Motorsports’ nine-race Daytona 500 losing streak with a win on Monday in the rain-delayed “Great American Race.” He crossed under the white flag denoting the final lap at the exact moment a crash broke out behind him. The caution flag was thrown and he wasn’t quite sure if he was the official winner as he circled Daytona one final time.
The last Hendrick driver to win the Daytona 500 was Dale Earnhardt Jr. in 2014. Byron, a 26-year-old from Charlotte, North Carolina, is the sixth different driver to win the 500 for Rick Hendrick, the winningest team owner in NASCAR history who made his way to victory lane on the actual 40th anniversary of his first Cup win.
“The first time we came here, we didn’t think we had any business even being here,” Hendrick said in victory lane. “We felt way out of our league. Now here we are 40 years later. You couldn’t write the script any better. To win this on the 40th, to the day, it’s just awesome.”
The ninth Daytona 500 win for Hendrick Motorsports tied the team with Petty Enterprises for most in NASCAR history.
“William Byron was already a superstar, and I mean, he just went to another level of being superstar,” said Hendrick vice chairman Jeff Gordon, himself a three-time Daytona 500 winner in the No. 24 Chevrolet.
“I wasn’t driving the car, but I felt like I was making every lap out there with him,” he said. “We’re going to celebrate. This is a huge win.”
Byron, who had never finished higher than 21st in the Daytona 500, is a self-taught racer who used computer equipment to hone his skills. He made it to the championship last season when he won a career-high six races, but he lost out on the title to Ryan Blaney, the older brother of Byron’s longtime girlfriend.
“I’m just a kid from racing on computers and winning the Daytona 500, I can’t believe it,” Byron said. “I wish my dad was here. He’s sick, but this is for him, man. We’ve been through so much, and we sat up in the grandstands together and watched the race.”
The fourth and final caution of the race began when Hendrick driver Alex Bowman hit Byron from behind and it caused Byron to sideswipe Brad Keselowski and trigger a 23-car crash that caused a red flag that lasted more than 15 minutes.
There were four laps remaining on the final restart and Byron was in second in the No. 24 Chevrolet. He and Ross Chastain of Trackhouse Racing pushed back and forth for the lead and it was Byron out front as a crash broke out behind him just as he’d crossed under the white flag marking the final lap of the race.
Byron was followed by teammate Bowman in a 1-2 sweep for Chevrolet and Hendrick. Christopher Bell in a Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing finished third and was followed by Chevys from Corey Lajoie of Spire Motorsports and AJ Allmendinger of Kaulig Racing.
Bubba Wallace was sixth in a Toyota for 23XI Racing and was followed by John Hunter Nemecheck in another Toyota but for Legacy Motor Club. Chase Briscoe was eighth in a Ford for Stewart-Haas Racing and followed by Legacy driver Erik Jones and SHR teammate Noah Gragson.
The race ran one day later than scheduled because of persistent rain all weekend at Daytona. Monday was supposed to open with the rescheduled second-tier Xfinity Series race and then lead into the 500, but when it was still raining Monday morning, NASCAR reordered the events and made the Xfinity race the closer.
There was no pre-race concert Monday as scheduled performer Pitbull said he’d return next year to make good on his appearance. He said a scheduling conflict prevented him from staying in Daytona on Monday, but grand marshal Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson did stay the extra day and was the most popular attraction in pre-race activities.
Johnson was swarmed on the starting grid, in the fan zone and received the loudest ovation in the pre-race driver meeting, to which he showed up 30 minutes ahead of schedule wearing a black tank top.
The flexibility NASCAR has shown this month in working within its schedule to avoid inclement weather is practically unprecedented in the first 75 hours of the series. NASCAR, to start the month, moved the exhibition Clash at the Coliseum up a full day because of impending rain. At Daytona, it rescheduled the ARCA Series race from Saturday to Friday night and made early decisions to move both the Xfinity and Cup Series races.
The decision to postpone the Cup race a day was made early Sunday morning and prevented fans from sitting in rain-soaked grandstands to see if the race would begin.
Just hours later, teams used Sunday’s rain delay to reveal to The Associated Press that they have hired one of the country’s top antitrust and sports lawyers to advise them in their ongoing dispute with NASCAR over a new revenue-sharing model.
The decision to hire Jeffrey Kessler, partner and co-executive chair of Winston & Strawn LLP, followed a meeting at Daytona that included the majority owner from every chartered team. Although the teams invited NASCAR representatives to attend, none did.
Kessler’s hiring was revealed to AP by the five members of the team ownership negotiating committee. It comes amid a breakdown in negotiations between teams and NASCAR that led the 36 chartered teams to decline last month to extend their exclusive negotiating window with the sanctioning body on the existing deal.
Bowman never saw how “the big one” started. He just knew he was involved.
He was surprised to learn he triggered it.
Bowman sparked the crash that involved nearly two dozen cars and knocked six former NASCAR champions out of contention in the Daytona 500 on Monday night.
Bowman was bump-drafting Byron on the backstretch with nine laps to go when Byron lost control, turned into Keselowski and pretty much wrecked the field.
“I can’t even see far enough (ahead) to see that Byron hitting Keselowski is what started it,” Bowman said. “I knew I had William in a spot that I didn’t want to have him in. But we’re all just sort of sandwiched up there.
“I was lifting to try to get off him once he was aimed the wrong place. But we’re all just shoving each other. That’s what speedway racing has kind of become. If it’s my fault, I didn’t mean to crash anybody by any means.”
Byron and Bowman were the biggest beneficiaries of the melee. They escaped with little damage to their cars and went on to give Hendrick a 1-2 finish.
The damage was epic for everyone else, even for a race that is known for spectacular crashes and mangled cars in every direction.
“Some of those situations where you get to be that ping-pong guy between two cars, you’re a little bit along for the ride,” Bowman said.
Bowman’s ride was hardly as detrimental as it was for at least 20 others. Defending Cup Series champion Ryan Blaney was knocked out along with fellow former champs Chase Elliott, Keselowski, Kyle Larson, Joey Logano and Martin Truex Jr.
Three-time Daytona 500 champ Denny Hamlin as well as the past two winners of NASCAR’s season opener, Austin Cindric and Ricky Stenhouse Jr., also were involved.
“Speedway racing again,” Logano said. “It’s a lot of fun until this happens. It was pretty interesting with a lot of pushing and shoving there at the end. … The pushes are stupid the whole time. The whole thing, everybody just gets more and more intense.
“You know it’s going to happen. Anyone can see it happening. You just know it. It happens every year. With 10 to go. there’s going to be a caution. You just hope you’re not in it and you can’t ride around. … It’s usually the people that start the wreck that stay alive. That’s the frustrating part.”
The race was mostly a green-flag affair until drivers started bumping, banging and making moves down the stretch. Bowman was trying to be a good teammate and work with Byron to get to the front. They eventually did, just not the way anyone else wanted.
“Once you get that few laps left in the race, it’s gridlock, so you’re pretty much doing your best to push,” Cindric said.
And everyone lives with the results, which is what Bowman will do. He had a chance to pass Byron on the last lap before another wreck brought out a final caution. NASCAR froze the field and declared Byron the winner by a few feet.
“I’d rather be second than crash,” Bowman said. “I would have liked to just race for it. … It’s awesome to see us get a 1-2 finish, but being this close to winning the Daytona 500, it certainly hurts. But 30th probably hurts worse.”
Jimmie Johnson could only watch on pit road as the familiar, jubilant scene that twice before was for him raged around Daytona.
Fireworks exploded above him and a Hendrick Motorsports car – the organization Johnson once helped shape into the best in NASCAR – peeled off while the Daytona 500 checkered flag stuck out Byron’s window.
The Daytona 500 was the kind of race in his championship heyday that Johnson was always a threat to win. Heck, Johnson won it twice, in 2006 and 2013, while driving for Rick Hendrick.
He’s found the venue tougher to master in his return to NASCAR as a part-time driver and full-time team owner of Legacy Motor Club. Johnson was collected in a multi-car wreck only six laps into the race on Monday night, plummeted out of contention and finished 28th in the No. 84 Toyota.
“I had hoped to race longer. It’s a matter of time before you get caught up in something around here,” Johnson said.
The seven-time NASCAR champion and newest Hall of Fame inductee had a more successful night as team owner than he did as a driver. Legacy drivers John Hunter Nemechek and Erik Jones finished seventh and eighth, respectively.
“Two top-10s on both cars, that’s good stuff,” Johnson said.
Johnson turned around and smiled as he saw Byron’s team celebrate in the distance. They were teammates at Hendrick for three seasons before Johnson stepped away from NASCAR at the end of 2020.
“No joke, he was trick-or-treating at my house when he was a kid,” Johnson said. “He handed me a little autograph card that said, ‘Someday I’m going to be your teammate.’ I tapped him on the head and said, ‘Yeah, sure kid. Sure you are.’ Now he just won the Daytona 500.”
Hendrick acknowledged the oddity of Johnson not being part of the team for another big win.
“It was funny seeing Jimmie out there tonight and not being in our car,” Hendrick said. “That felt really weird.”
Johnson came dangerously close to missing the cut for the race.
He didn’t have the speed in time trials to earn a spot in the 40-car field. It meant Johnson had to race his way in. He survived a late spin that put him in a precarious position, only to pull off a comeback with a three-wide move through the final turn that locked him into his 21st Daytona 500.
It was the last Daytona thrill for Johnson, at least this time.
“There’s optimism in the beginning, hopeful we could straighten out the suspension and then at least run in the draft,” Johnson said. “Then, as time went on, we realized the severity of the damage and we just had too much damage to even really hang in the draft unless I had a unique situation. So then, at that point it was just wondering if there were going to be more cautions and if we would gain some positions through the cautions.”
Even with a disheartening result, Johnson won’t rule out another run at the Daytona 500. He used a #OneFinalTime hashtag ahead of his expected final Daytona 500 in 2020. He won’t be so hasty for his next one.
“As long as we can find partners, I’ll keep coming back,” Johnson said. “Others said that I retired. I never said it.”
Johnson had a two-year dalliance in IndyCar before he returned for three Cup races last season. He got caught in a late wreck in last year’s Daytona 500 and finished 31st. He was 38th and 37th in his two other starts.
Johnson said he’ll fly back to his London home on Tuesday and likely return to the United States in three weeks in his owner’s hat for the race at Phoenix Raceway. He’ll be back in the No. 84 in April at Texas Motor Speedway and then for seven more races this season, still looking for his first Cup since June 4, 2017, at Dover Motor Speedway.
Until then, Johnson was glad to have at least one more race at Daytona – where he palled around with the band Creed and NSYNC member Joey Fatone, his race-day fit was a cowboy hat and fans flocked to him as he remained a must-get for the autograph hounds.
“I soaked it in as much as I could, even rolling around with a wounded car,” Johnson said. “But to be here, and be part of the race, especially with the test that we had as a team on Thursday to get into the race, the results weren’t what we wanted, but it was very special.”
AP sports writers Dan Gelston and Mark Long contributed to this story.
