The 65th Annual Daytona 500 is scheduled for this Sunday as the first points race of the season takes place at Daytona International Speedway. Ford has won “The Great American Race” a total of 17 times, including each of the past two seasons when Michael McDowell and Austin Cindric captured the championship.
JOEY LOGANO
2015 DAYTONA 500 CHAMPION
“Everyone has a chance to win that race and it is truly career changing when you’re able to do it. Everyone wants to have that on their resume and say they’ve won the Daytona 500 and then obviously the great things that come along with that, so it’s a big one you want to get.”
MICHAEL MCDOWELL
2021 DAYTONA 500 CHAMPION
“It’s not just standing in Victory Lane. It was the journey getting there that makes this ring and that moment really special. It was a grind and it was tough, so it’s a good reminder of just staying in the grind, working hard, and persevering during difficult times and it paid off.”
AUSTIN CINDRIC
2022 DAYTONA 500 CHAMPION
“I’ve only been doing this for a year now in the Cup Series, but you look at guys who have worked here for 10-20 years and what something like that means. It’s a career achievement for a lot of the people on my team and to be able to deliver that given the opportunity, for me, there’s nothing cooler than being able to do that.”
FORD GOING FOR THIRD STRAIGHT DAYTONA 500 WIN
As noted above, Ford has won the Daytona 500 17 times by 14 different drivers after Austin Cindric captured last year’s race. That marked Ford’s second consecutive victory in “The Great American Race” and fourth in the last eight years after Joey Logano won in 2015 and Kurt Busch in 2017. Only three Ford drivers have won the Daytona 500 more than once. Bill Elliott was the first to do it (1985 and 1987) with Dale Jarrett (1996 and 2000) and Matt Kenseth (2009 and 2012) following.
FORD DOMINATES 2022 DAYTONA 500
Austin Cindric started off his first full-time season in the NASCAR Cup Series with a bang by winning last year’s Daytona 500 in only his second attempt. Cindric got a push and then had to fend off his teammate Ryan Blaney on the outside off Turn 4 coming to the checkered flag to become the first rookie to win the Great American Race. It was a stellar day for Ford overall, claiming four of the top-five and seven of the top-10 finishing positions. Chase Briscoe came home 3rd, Ryan Blaney 4th and Aric Almirola 5th.
A DUEL SWEEP FOR RFK
You couldn’t script a better beginning for the debut season of Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing as the newly-formed organization won both of the Duel races last year. Brad Keselowski, who joined the organization as co-owner with Jack Roush and the Fenway Sports Group, drove his No. 6 Mustang to victory in the first qualifying race while Chris Buescher followed suit in the second. Here’s what both drivers had to say in looking back on that moment:
BRAD KESELOWSKI
“It was a little bit of a shock. I didn’t expect us to have that level of success that quick, and we quickly got humbled in the weeks to come, but it was not what we expected at all. Sometimes you get shocked in bad ways. Sometimes you get shocked in great ways, and it’s nice to get shocked in a great way.”
CHRIS BUESCHER
“There was just so much change and so many unknowns. There was so much hard work put in before that it was nice to see it come to fruition and produce results immediately. It was a late night, but it was something that I think everybody really was able to take in and get everyone fired up, not only at the racetrack, but back at the shop in Concord as well.”
TINY LUND COMES UP BIG FOR WOOD BROTHERS
Ford won the Daytona 500 for the first time on Feb. 24, 1963 when Tiny Lund took the Wood Brothers to Victory Lane and completed a script that would have made Hollywood envious. Lund didn’t have a ride for the 500, but was at the track watching Marvin Panch test a Maserati when the car went out of control, flipped upside-down and started on fire. Lund, along with four others, rushed to the scene and eventually pulled Panch to safety. Panch, who was the primary driver for the Wood Brothers, was unable to race in the 500 due to his injuries, so the team tabbed Lund as a substitute. Lund defied the odds by winning the race on one set of tires to give For and the Wood Brothers their first win in “The Great American Race.”
KENSETH WINS EXPLOSIVE DAYTONA 500
When Ford won the Daytona 500 on Feb. 27, 2012 with Matt Kenseth, it marked his second victory in four years. But while Kenseth will be recognized for becoming the ninth multiple winner of the race, the weekend will forever be remembered for a series of unforeseen events. For the first time in its 54-year history, the race had to be postponed until Monday due to rain. As lingering showers persisted the next day, NASCAR officials decided to make it a primetime event for the first time. The race was building to a climax when caution came out on lap 157. During the ensuing caution, something broke on Juan Pablo Montoya’s car and sent it careening into a jet dryer that was working on the track. An explosion ensued and resulted in a red flag that lasted more than two hours as officials repaired the track. There were no major injuries, but the incident resulted in one of the more memorable photos ever taken as driver Brad Keselowski used his cell phone to post a shot from his vantage point on the backstretch. Kenseth eventually held off Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Roush Fenway teammate Greg Biffle on a green-white-checker finish to win.
A CINDERELLA STORY
Ford won the Daytona 500 for the 15th time after Kurt Busch took the checkered flag for Stewart-Haas Racing in its debut event with the manufacturer in 2017. That Cinderella story marked Ford’s fourth Daytona 500 win in a seven-year period, a streak that started with another Disney-type story when Trevor Bayne became the youngest Daytona 500 winner in 2011. The victory was even more memorable because it came one day after his 20th birthday and in only his second career NASCAR Cup Series start for the Wood Brothers.
LOGANO GIVES FORD FIRST SWEEP OF DAYTONA SPEEDWEEKS
Joey Logano survived an intense final 10 laps, including a green-white-checkered finish, to give Ford a sweep of Daytona Speedweeks by winning the 57th running of the Daytona 500 in 2015. The win came on the heels of Tyler Reddick winning the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series and Ryan Reed taking the checkered flag for the first time in the NASCAR XFINITY Series event. It also capped an undefeated month of racing at Daytona for Ford, which also won the season-opening Rolex 24 Hours. In the end, Logano used a push from Clint Bowyer to get in front of the pack, but when caution came out with three laps to go for an accident involving Justin Allgaier, the field bunch back up for the deciding restart. As the leader, Logano opted for the outside line and that proved to be the right decision as he got ahead of Denny Hamlin on the inside and stayed in front until the caution came out on the final lap to officially end the race.
COLE CUSTER RETURNING
TO NASCAR XFINITY SERIES
After running the last three seasons in the NASCAR Cup Series, where he won once at Kentucky Speedway and earned 2020 rookie of the year, Cole Custer is back to compete for a championship in the NASCAR Xfinity Series. Custer owns 10 career NXS victories, including seven in 2019 when he finished second in the overall standings. He currently ranks 10th on the all-time Ford win list, trailing Chase Briscoe by only one for ninth.
ZANE SMITH READY TO DEFEND TRUCK TITLE
Zane Smith will once again be running a full NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series season with Front Row Motorsports as he looks to win a second straight championship. Smith, who gave the organization its first NASCAR title after winning last year’s season finale at Phoenix Raceway, will also be competing in a limited number of NASCAR Cup and NASCAR Xfinity Series events as well during the 2023 campaign.
THORSPORT BACK WITH FORD
It was announced in December that ThorSport Racing was returning to Ford Performance for the 2023 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series season and would once again field four trucks on a full-time basis. Hailie Deegan will be running her first season with the organization while Ty Majeski and former series champions Matt Crafton and Ben Rhodes round out the lineup. Crafton won a championship during the team’s last stint with Ford in 2019, marking his record-tying third title overall.
