DAYTONA 500
Friday, February 13 – NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, 7:30 p.m. ET (FS1)
Saturday, February 14 – NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series, 5 p.m. ET (CW)
Sunday, February 15 – NASCAR Cup Series, 2:30 p.m. ET (FOX)
The NASCAR season gets started full speed this weekend as all three of the sport’s top touring series hit the track for the first time in 2026. Daytona Speedweeks will feature the debut of O’Reilly Auto Parts as a series title sponsor and culminate with the 68th running of the Daytona 500.
FORD AND THE 500
Ford has won the Daytona 500 a total of 17 times with the last being four years ago when Austin Cindric (2022) captured the race in just his second attempt. Tiny Lund registered Ford’s first win in ‘The Great American Race’ when he subbed for Marvin Panch and drove the Wood Brothers to their first 500 win in 1963. Bill Elliott, Dale Jarrett and Matt Kenseth are the only drivers to win the event more than once with Ford, but that could grow by one if either Joey Logano or Cindric find Victory Lane on Sunday.
BLANEY GOING FOR CONSECUTIVE DAYTONA WINS
Ford driver Ryan Blaney will be making his 12th start in the Daytona 500 this weekend and he would like nothing better for it to end up the way it did a few months ago. That’s when Blaney came from 13th to first in the final two laps of the regular season finale to win the Coke Zero Sugar 400 in August. That marked his second career summer Cup win at Daytona, a facility that has been feast or famine for him throughout his career. That’s because in 21 all-time series starts, he has nine finishes of seventh or better, seven finishes of 30th or worse, and nine DNFs. The last Cup driver to win consecutive races at DIS was Jimmie Johnson in 2013.
PREECE RIDING HIGH
Ryan Preece comes into this weekend’s Daytona 500 still riding high after his win in last week’s Clash at Bowman Gray Stadium. The Connecticut native successfully navigated rain, sleet, ice and other obstacles to lead the final 45 laps and post the first win of his NASCAR Cup Series career. As a result, he will try to become the first driver to win the Clash and 500 since Denny Hamlin did it in 2016. In six career Daytona 500 starts, Preece has a pair of top 10 finishes with his best effort being sixth in 2021.
BUESCHER ON TOP 10 RUN AT DAYTONA
Ford Mustang Dark Horse driver Chris Buescher has been on a roll of late with RFK Racing at Daytona International Speedway, coming into this weekend’s “Great American Race” having finished 10th or better five times in his last six starts at the superspeedway. That includes a victory in the 2023 regular season finale when he got a decisive push from teammate and co-owner Brad Keselowski, and led the final two laps of overtime. In 10 Daytona 500 starts, Buescher’s best finish is third (2020).
SMITH HOPING TO JOIN CINDRIC ON FORD DAYTONA LIST
Zane Smith will be making his third Daytona 500 start and a victory on Sunday would make him the second active Ford driver to win at the World Center of Speed in multiple series. Smith has a pair of NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series victories with those coming in back-to-back seasons (2022 and 2023) while Cindric registered his Daytona wins in Cup (2022) and NOAPS (2021).
RYAN PREECE: “For me, it’s going out for qualifying night, try to get it on the pole, and keep this momentum going. When you have this good feeling, you want to harness it and keep capitalizing on it, just let it set the bar for the season, how you want to continue to be. The people that know me from racing modifieds and where I come from, how I won races, they know my passion, they know my drive and how I hate losing more than I love winning. I want people nationally, around the country, to see that, too. I’m looking forward to it.”
RYAN BLANEY: “You work with your guys through the week and in the winter, but nothing is better than working with them at the racetrack, kind of getting that camaraderie back, the communication side down, just getting back to what you’re used to. I look forward to getting back with my guys, getting the year rolling, and seeing how the week goes in Daytona.”
CINDRIC KICKS OFF ROOKIE SEASON IN STYLE
Austin Cindric started off his first full-time season in the NASCAR Cup Series with Team Penske with a bang by winning the 2022 Daytona 500 in only his second attempt. Cindric got a push and then had to fend off his teammate, Ryan Blaney, coming to the checkered flag to become the first rookie to win the Great American Race. Blaney made contact with Cindric and hit the outside wall, sealing the No. 2 driver’s fate to claim his first career Cup Series victory. 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, Blaney 4th and Aric Almirola 5th to complete the top five.
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.
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 caught 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 Ford and the Wood Brothers their first victory in “The Great American Race.”
NOAPS CHANGES
NASCAR’s second tier series is now known as the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series, but that isn’t the only change happening in 2026. Ford will have a pair of new drivers in addition to one new race team as Hettinger Racing joins the roster. The team announced that Luke Fenhaus will drive the No. 5 Ford Mustang Dark Horse at Daytona as they compete for the first time in the series. AM Racing is back and will have a new driver with Nick Sanchez getting behind the wheel for his Ford Racing debut.
SHIFTING NUMBERS
ThorSport Racing has seen two drivers shift numbers for 2026. Ty Majeski is moving over to take the wheel of the No. 88 Ford F-150 that three-time series champion Matt Crafton piloted for 25 years. Going into the No. 98 that Majeski drove the past three seasons is Jake Garcia, who will be competing in his third full-time campaign with the organization. Rookie Cole Butcher will assume Garcia’s No. 13 while two-time series champ Ben Rhodes, who joined ThorSport in 2016, stays in his familiar No. 99 for the eighth straight year.
FRONT ROW DUO RETURNS
This will mark the second straight season Layne Riggs and Chandler Smith team up at Front Row Motorsports. Both drivers made the playoffs a year ago and combined to win all five of Ford’s series races with Riggs winning three times and Smith twice. Riggs, who has five career series victories in two full seasons, will be back in his No. 34 Ford F-150 while Smith prepares for double duty this weekend as he drives his regular No. 38 truck and attempts to qualify for the Daytona 500 in the No. 36 Ford Mustang Dark Horse for FRM.
FORD’S DAYTONA 500 WINNERS
1963 – Tiny Lund (Wood Brothers)
1965 – Fred Lorenzen (Holman-Moody)
1967 – Mario Andretti (Holman-Moody)
1969 – LeeRoy Yarbrough (Junior Johnson)
1978 – Bobby Allison (Bud Moore)
1985 – Bill Elliott (Harry Melling)
1987 – Bill Elliott (Harry Melling)
1992 – Davey Allison (Robert Yates)
1996 – Dale Jarrett (Robert Yates)
2000 – Dale Jarrett (Robert Yates)
2009 – Matt Kenseth (Jack Roush)
2011 – Trevor Bayne (Wood Brothers)
2012 – Matt Kenseth (Jack Roush)
2015 – Joey Logano (Roger Penske)
2017 – Kurt Busch (Stewart-Haas)
2021 – Michael McDowell (Front Row)
2022 – Austin Cindric (Roger Penske)
FORD’S NOAPS DAYTONA WINNERS
1995 – Chad Little (1)
2004 – Mike Wallace (2)
2015 – Ryan Reed (1)
2016 – Aric Almirola (2)
2017 – Ryan Reed (1)
2021 – Austin Cindric (1)
FORD’S NASCAR CRAFTSMAN TRUCK SERIES DAYTONA WINNERS
2000 – Mike Wallace
2003 – Rick Crawford
2004 – Carl Edwards
2006 – Mark Martin
2015 – Tyler Reddick
2020 – Grant Enfinger
2022 – Zane Smith
2023 – Zane Smith
As the spirit of America, the Ford Mustang is the world’s best selling sports car and one of the planet’s most popular race cars. With Mustang-based race cars competing in international sports car competition (GT3 and GT4), NASCAR, NHRA, Formula Drift, in Supercars, at the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb and in its own bespoke regional one-make series – Mustang Cup and Mustang Challenge – the platform has an unprecedented global reach. This weekend, 18 Mustang race cars are scheduled to race across all disciplines. Learn more about Mustang at www.FordRacing.com .
