By Miguel Mike Medina
Photo: NASCAR
Back to back! William Byron does it again. Byron becomes the fifth driver in NASCAR history to repeat in the Daytona 500.
Byron joins Richard Petty, Cale Yarborough, Sterling Marlin, and Denny Hamlin.
It didn’t come easy for Byron. Luck played a factor in this competition. There were several wrecks involving Joey Logano and Denny Hamlin. Christopher Bell hit the wall. Hamlin got turned and went into the wall.
“We were in a great spot many times in the last 10 laps,” Hamlin said. “I appreciate National Debt Relief coming on and giving them a great ride, but we didn’t have the caution on the first front straightaway spin, and I was like, well, that’s the second lease on life to try to get the two. So I measured up the two, got to run on them, and stayed with him enough to control what side I wanted to pass him on.”
Hamlin has won the Dayton 509 three times in his career.
All these accidents in the Daytona 500 led Byron and Tyler Reddick to take advantage of their opportunities. Reddick finished second in the race, and Jimmie Johnson finished third—his eighth Top 5 finish in the Daytona 500.
Regardless, Byron did a fascinating job racing on Sunday and has again reached the winners’ circle.
“I trusted my instinct on the last lap there,” Byron said. “I felt like they would get squirrely on the bottom and just tried to. I was going to go in the third lane regardless because I was probably six coming down the back, so I was obviously fortunate that it worked out in our favor. Still, I am proud of this team that worked hard all week and had an amazing car. I just had a tough time with the fuel-saving and staying towards the front.”
The Daytona 500 is a special event—it’s the Super Bowl of NASCAR. To win the event for the second year in a row is truly amazing for Bryon and the team.
“It’s obviously really special,” Byron said. “It’s an amazing race and a lot of crazing racing out there tonight and just a lot of pushing and shoving, but just really proud of our team. I can’t stress that enough. I’m just super thankful for this group.”
Miguel Mike Medina is the publisher of The MMM Journal. He can be reached at medinamiguelmike@gmail.com and themmmjournal@gmail.com
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