The Daytona 500 is one of the most famous motor races in the world, and it is an event that many people have probably heard of, even if they have never watched it, or know exactly what it is all about. The Daytona 500 is one of the major highlights of the long NASCAR season and actually serves as a spectacular curtain-raiser to the campaign.
As the running of the 2025 Daytona 500 approaches this weekend, we take a look ahead to 200 nail-biting laps of high-speed motor racing action. Find out who the favourites are for this year’s edition, what happened 12 months ago, and just what the hype is all about.
When and where is the Daytona 500?
The Daytona 500 is held in Florida, at the Daytona International Speedway, which is an oval track, the most commonly found style of racetrack in NASCAR. Daytona, however, is classed as a ‘superspeedway’ track because it is more than two miles in length.
The only other track on the NASCAR circuit to be classified as a ‘superspeedway’ is Talladega in Alabama. Daytona International is located about 50 miles north of Orlando, and it was opened in 1959. Viewers in Ireland and the UK can tune in to watch the Daytona 500 action get underway from around 19:30 GMT (14:30 Eastern Standard Time).
Race details
Despite the name, the race is not 500 laps of the track; it’s 200 laps, which equates to a 500-mile race, as the track is 2.5 miles long. The Daytona 500 isn’t just one long blast like a Formula One race is, for example, as it’s actually split into three stages.
Stages 1 and 2 are each 65 laps in length, and the final stage of the race is 70 laps. At the end of each of the stages, the drivers in the top 10 all receive points. The winner of a stage gets a further bonus point that counts towards the NASCAR Playoffs.
The winner of the third and final stage is the race winner. The purpose of breaking the contest into stages is to encourage drivers to push throughout the entirety of the race, and not just try to conserve their engine and tyres for a final mad dash at the end.
The in-race points are there to reward strong, consistent driving, and as those points all count towards the season’s tally in the NASCAR Cup Series, drivers can’t afford to take their foot off the gas.
What is NASCAR?
NASCAR is the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, which was founded back in 1948 in Daytona Beach. That’s why the Daytona 500 is a much-loved race, as it’s the home of NASCAR, with the sport having a huge following.
The sport originally used production-model cars, which were then tweaked a bit for racing – this is where the name ‘stock car’ came from. However, it has naturally evolved into a specialised, high-tech industry for car development, and the cars of NASCAR today aren’t actually stock cars. They are, instead, purpose-built machines.
The Daytona 500 is part of the NASCAR Cup Series, which is the highest level of the sport, and the 2025 edition has 30 oval races, five road races and one race on a street track. The season also includes four non-championship races, and along the way, the NASCAR Xfinity Series can also be enjoyed. This is the second-tier circuit to the Cup Series.
The goal of the drivers through the regular season is to earn enough points to compete in the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs, a series of elimination rounds, which begin in August. Those playoffs build up towards the finale, where the championship title is decided. NASCAR races are held right across America from Florida to California, Michigan, New York, Tennessee and Nevada.
Curtain-raiser to the 2025 NASCAR season
The Daytona 500 is one of the most prestigious races in NASCAR as it’s steeped in history and has the largest prize purse of all races. Once again, it will get that bit of extra attention in 2025 because it is the opening race of the season.
This is a little unusual in major sports because normally, the headline-grabbing races are held towards the end of a campaign. However, the start of a new season in any sport is always fascinating, and NASCAR is no different.
The Daytona 500 gives race fans their first chance to take a look at new drivers, new team set-ups and, of course, the new cars after their off-season developments. So, it will be all eyes on the drivers and new cars lining up on the track on Sunday.
Who is racing in 2025?
The initial entry list for the Daytona 500 made on 10th February saw 45 drivers vying for 40 places. There are 36 charter cars, which are teams that are guaranteed a spot in every race and who also qualify to take a share of race winnings.
Charter cars have to perform to certain standards to retain their status, and among this year’s charters at the Daytona 500, the likes of Ryan Blaney (No. 12 Ford Mustang), Kyle Busch (No. 8 Chevrolet ZL1) and Denny Hamlin (No. 11 Toyota Camry XSE) will be racing.
This leaves nine non-chartered (Open) cars to battle for the four remaining open spots. Those positions will be sorted out during single-car qualifying and then Duels, all of which will also settle the starting positions on the grid for Sunday.
Among the non-chartered cars trying to make the Daytona 500 race on Sunday, Jimmie Johnson (No. 84 Toyota Camry XSE) and the semi-retired part-timer Martin Truex Jr. (No. 56 Toyota Camry XSE) will have to work towards qualification for the big race, along with Corey LaJoie (No. 01 Ford Mustang and Justin Allgaier (No. 40 Chevrolet). Allgaier is the reigning NASCAR Xfinity Series Champion and will pilot JR Motorsports’ first-ever drive in the Daytona 500.
The all-time most successful driver in the history of the Daytona 500 is Richard Petty, who won it seven times between 1964 and 1981 inclusive. Petty, whose nickname was ‘The King’, is one of the greatest stock car drivers of all time and famously drove the No. 43 Plymouth/Pontiac for Petty Enterprises.
Last 10 Daytona 500 Winners
- 2015 – Joey Logano (Team Penske, Ford Fusion)
- 2016 – Denny Hamlin (Joe Gibbs Racing, Toyota Camry)
- 2017 – Kurt Busch (Haas Racing, Ford Fusion)
- 2018 – Austin Dillon (Richard Childress Racing, Chevrolet Camaro ZL1)
- 2019 – Denny Hamlin (Joe Gibbs Racing, Toyota Camry)
- 2020 – Denny Hamlin (Joe Gibbs Racing, Toyota Camry)
- 2021 – Michael McDowell (Front Row Motorsports, Ford Mustang)
- 2022 – Austin Cindric (Team Penske, Ford Mustang)
- 2023 – Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (JTG Daugherty Racing, Chevrolet Camaro ZL1)
- 2024 – William Byron (Hendrick Motorsports, Chevrolet Camaro ZL1)
2024 Daytona 500 in review
Few would have seen William Byron coming through to take the win at last year’s Daytona 500 as he claimed the victory among some chaotic late drama. With eight laps to go, he took a knock and, in turn, bumped into Brad Keselowski, who subsequently turned into Joey Logano, and Ryan Blaney was also caught up in a subsequent 23-car mess.
Byron was fine to continue, but Keselowski, Blaney and Logano (who had started the race from Pole) had to leave the race, which was under a red flag for 15 minutes while the massive clean-up job went on. There was a restart on Lap 197, producing a mad scramble for positions with little track left to run until the finish.
Byron got to the white flag first (to indicate the final lap), and just after he did, there was another mess in the field behind him as two cars skidded into the infield, causing the race to end under caution. Byron crossed the line first and his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Alex Bowman finished runner-up.
In total, there were 41 lead changes between 20 different drivers, and the race lasted just under three hours and 11 minutes. Byron’s win came after hitting the front for the first time in the race and he led for a total of four laps. Joey Logano topped the charts for most laps led in the 2024 Daytona 500 with 45, but failed to finish due to the chaos of Lap 192.
Favourites for 2025
Denny Hamlin is attempting to win his fourth ‘Great American Race’. He is the only three-time winner in the field and just one of six drivers ever to have won the famous race at least three times. Given that proven track record in Daytona, he is expected to be among the frontrunners. If Jimmie Johnson doesn’t qualify, then Hamlin will also be the only driver in the race to have won it more than once.
Joey Logano is the reigning Cup Series champion and has tasted victory before at the Daytona 500 when he took the chequered flag in 2015.
Ryan Blaney is another big frontrunner and finished last season in top form. It’s likely only a matter of time before he scores a big race like this in his career, and he’s got very close twice before, finishing as the runner-up in 2017 and 2020. Overall, Blaney has a great record of five top-10 finishes at Daytona.
Brad Keselowski, whose best Daytona 500 finish is third place, is also right up there in the mix according to the pre-race odds. Along with Logano and Blaney, the trio are experts on longer tracks such as Daytona.
Catch all the pre-race odds for the Daytona 500 motorsports betting at Tonybet. Explore options such as Pole Position, Top 3 Finish, Top 5 Finish and plenty of up-to-the-minute live in-play odds based on the latest standings as the nail-biting 200 laps roar by.
Bet on the Daytona 500 at Tonybet today!
