DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Strip away the high-priced cars and palatial race shops. Look beyond the engines that produce so much horsepower that your chest vibrates when 40 of them roar by. And take your eyes past the spectacle of a Saturday night sky filled with fireworks at the birthplace of NASCAR.
Then you will find the soul of stock car racing.
It is in family.
The Frances still run this sport after more than three quarters of a century. The Pettys remain royalty. The Woods continue to link to the sport’s past after winning a NASCAR race for an eighth consecutive decade.
Leading the Woods to their 100th Cup win Saturday night at Daytona International Speedway was 23-year-old Harrison Burton, who joined his father Jeff and uncle Ward as a Cup winner.
Helping Harrison Burton get there was spotter Jason Jarrett, son of NASCAR Hall of Famer Dale Jarrett, who memorably was guided to a Daytona 500 win by his father Ned on the TV broadcast.
As Burton held off Kyle Busch by .047 seconds to win, Jeff Burton punched the air in the NBC broadcast booth high above the finish line.
It was an unexpected conclusion to a taut three-hour drama that saw two cars go airborne, one spinning like a top on its roof after a ride unlike anything you could find at Disney World.
Yet, there was one person who knew Burton would win.
Eight-year-old Bailey Wood — who someday may be the fourth generation to lead the Wood Brothers Racing team — repeatedly said Saturday that Burton would score his first career Cup victory. Sure, Bailey is biased. His dad, Jon, became the team’s president this year. But Bailey was right.
He had faith even when others didn’t. Harrison Burton is losing his ride after this season. Josh Berry will replace him. The Woods hadn’t won a race since 2017.
The last driver to win for the team before Saturday night was Ryan Blaney, who admitted he became a “fanboy” on the final lap.
Blaney had exited the infield care center and was being taken by a golf cart back to his motorhome when he realized he would not make it there in time to catch the final lap. He “jumped off” the golf cart to watch the last lap on a TV outside another motorhome in the driver/owner lot.
“I was hooting and hollering,” Blaney said.
After Burton won, Blaney — still in his driver’s uniform — went to Victory Lane and stayed there, enjoying the moment nearly as much as if he had won the race.
“When I left the Wood Brothers,” Blaney said of his move to Team Penske in 2018, “they told me that even though you’re leaving, you’ll always be a part of our family.”
Just as Blaney took it all in, Jon Wood stood in Victory Lane, his phone buzzing and eyes full of wonder.
“I’m just trying to wrap my mind around it,” he told NBC Sports.
Jon turned and looked at his father Eddie and uncle Len.
“I think I’m happiest for those two,” Jon said.
Eddie and Len, along with their sister Kim, were the second generation to lead the family race team, guiding it through a period where the team ran a partial schedule because it didn’t have enough funding and faced questions about its long-term survival.
After missing the 2008 Coca-Cola 600 — the only time the event, which debuted in 1960, has been held without the Wood Brothers — family saved the team.
Two days after that race, Edsell Ford II, great-grandson of Henry Ford, founder of Ford Motor Company, called Eddie Wood.
“Why haven’t we talked lately?” Ford said to Eddie Wood.
“Mr. Ford, we’ve run so bad and I’m so ashamed,’’ Wood said. “I’m ashamed to call you.”
“So you’re telling me my 21 is broke?’’
“Yes sir. It’s broken. Really bad.’’
Within three days, Eddie and Len Wood were in Detroit meeting with a Ford executive to begin the process of rebuilding the organization.
They would be rewarded in 2011 when Trevor Bayne won the Daytona 500 and one of the more poignant moments took place. Richard Petty escorted Glen Wood to Victory Lane that day.
“That was pretty awesome,” Eddie Wood said that day.
Saturday night, the first phone call Eddie Wood got after Burton’s win was from Dale Inman, the Hall of Fame crew chief who guided his cousin Richard Petty through most of the legend’s career. During the winners’ press conference, Len Wood, walked off the stage to take a phone call. It was NASCAR Chairman Jim France.
As family and friends relished Saturday night, Jeff Burton waited to take a picture with his son and the trophy.
What was that moment going to mean to him?
“I’ll tell you in 20 years,” Jeff Burton said. “That’s why you take pictures. These moments are hard to come by. … I know how special it is and especially here with all the things that happen to make this sport.”
Through the whirlwind of emotions — Harrison Burton cried on his victory lane — Burton was trying to keep a hold of all the special moments.
“I hope I remember the feeling when you cross the line and you know you win,” he said.
He also hopes to remember one other moment in particular.
“When it hit home the most was when I got out of the car and turned around,” he said of exiting the car near the start/finish line.
“Everyone that’s laid a finger on this race car, laid a finger on the media side of things, management side of things, on my life as far as raising me, my fiancée has been on my side, I turn around, they’re all right there.
“Watching them all run out and celebrate with me was awesome.”
It was a family reunion.
