The first race of the Cup Series season is complete and the first playoff spot has gone to William Byron.
The Hendrick Motorsports driver took the white flag in Monday’s Daytona 500 as Ross Chastain and Austin Cindric crashed. This brought out the caution and ended the rain-postponed race. NASCAR officials reviewed the footage and determined that Byron was the winner.
MORE: Daytona 500 results
Alex Bowman, Christopher Bell, Corey LaJoie, Bubba Wallace, AJ Allmendinger, John Hunter Nemechek, Erik Jones, Noah Gragson and Chase Briscoe rounded out the top 10.
William Byron.
— NASCAR on NBC (@NASCARonNBC) February 20, 2024
Normal-sized hat, big #Daytona500 win. pic.twitter.com/SmaCgF3lix
Twenty cars finished on the lead lap after a race featuring three cautions for incidents.
The first occurred on Lap 5 as a push from Brad Keselowski turned Nemechek into Harrison Burton. This incident involved seven cars. Burton, Carson Hocevar and Kaz Grala were all unable to continue in the race. Austin Dillon fell 53 laps behind the leaders after going to the garage for repairs.
The second incident occurred on Lap 192 and involved 23 cars. Keselowski, Joey Logano, Ryan Blaney, Todd Gilliland, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Tyler Reddick and Daniel Suarez were all unable to continue.
The Cup season continues Sunday with another superspeedway race. The teams will take on Atlanta Motor Speedway at 3 p.m. ET.
