While last Sunday featured Super Bowl LIX on the football field, this Sunday is highlighted by the Super Bowl of stock car racing. It is the Daytona 500, also known as The Great American Race, as the NASCAR Cup Series officially begins its 2025 season. Sunday’s running will be the 67th edition of the event and, as has been the case since its inaugural race in 1959, the Daytona 500 will take place from Daytona International Speedway, a 2.5-mile tri-oval track in Daytona Beach, Florida.
Every Daytona 500 has its interesting quirks, and one involving this year’s race is that it will have more than 40 drivers for the first time in a decade. Manning the No. 41 spot will be a name very familiar to racing fans, albeit not as a NASCAR regular. It is Helio Castroneves, who is best known for his time in the IndyCar Series, where he won a record four Indianapolis 500 races. The 49-year-old Brazilian will make his Cup Series debut in the biggest race in the sport, hoping to add a Daytona 500 victory to his pair of wins at 24 Hours at Daytona.
Another notable race rookie is Shane van Gisbergen, who is a Trackhouse Racing teammate of Castroneves. The New Zealander infamously won his first-ever Cup Series race in 2023, becoming the first driver in 60 years to do so. At the other end of the experience spectrum are a pair of NASCAR part-timers in Jimmie Johnson and Martin Truex Jr. While they both have 20-plus Daytona starts under their respective belts, Johnson is a two-time winner, while Truex is hoping semi-retirement can bring him his first victory.
Johnson is one of eight past Daytona 500 winners in this year’s field, with Johnson (two) and Denny Hamlin (three) the only multi-time winners. Hamlin can move into rarefied company if he can notch a fourth victory, as only Cale Yarborough (four) and Richard Petty (seven) have claimed the checkered flag at Daytona at least four times. While having experience—and previous success—at The Great American Race is undoubtedly helpful, it’s certainly not a prerequisite to entering victory lane, as seen in recent Daytona 500 races.
The winning driver in three of the last four Daytona 500 races has likely made casual NASCAR fans say, “Wait, who won?” In 2023, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. won the race, which was just his third career victory in over 350 Cup Series starts. The year prior, Austin Cindric won the checkered flag, which was his first Cup Series win, in just his eighth start on the circuit, and Cindric has only prevailed once since then. Then, in 2021, Michael McDowell won the Crown Jewel Race, which was his first Cup Series win in his 358th start.
Even with that recent history favoring the underdogs, there is a clear group of favorites, starting with the three-time victor in Hamlin. Others include the reigning Cup Series champion Joey Logano, the defending Daytona 500 winner William Byron, and Chase Elliott, won just won NASCAR’s preseason race two weeks ago.
Bubba Wallace should also generate interest as he won the Duel 1 qualifying race on Thursday and will sit at No. 3 on the starting grid. Wallace finished runner-up at this event in both 2018 and 2022, and amongst all active drivers with a minimum of five starts at Daytona International, Wallace’s average finish of 11.9 is the very best.
However, the sports books’ favorite happens to be someone who has not only never won The Great American Race previously, but also has no victories of any kind over his last 57 starts. That man is Kyle Busch, who is 0-for-19 in his Daytona 500 career, but has the shortest odds to win. Busch is, literally, the greatest NASCAR driver to never win the Daytona 500 as his 63 Cup Series victories are the most in history without winning Daytona. Perhaps sentimentality is playing a role in Busch’s popularity as he hasn’t even notched a top-5 finish in each of his last five starts in this race.
Just as Super Bowl LIX was about more than just the Philadelphia Eagles versus Kansas City Chiefs, as entertainment played a role with appearances by Kendrick Lamar, Jon Batiste, Taylor Swift, and others, the same goes for the Super Bowl of Stock Car Racing. Michael Jordan, a NASCAR team owner, will be in Daytona, instead of at the NBA All-Star Game which takes place at nearly the same time.
Rapper Pitbull, who is a former team owner, will perform a pregame concert, and another musician in singer Chris Stapleton will be on hand to see the paint scheme he was involved with for a car. Meanwhile, “Captain America” actor Anthony Mackie will be the grand marshal, and the commander-in-chief, President Donald Trump, is expected to be in attendance as well.
The green flag for the 2025 Daytona 500 will drop at 1:30 p.m. ET, as the time was moved up one hour with rain expected. The race will air on FOX, with Chase Briscoe starting in pole position.
