The 2022 Coke Zero Sugar 400 at Daytona International Speedway has been postponed a day later from its original starting date on Saturday, August 27, due to inclement weather.
The announcement comes after NASCAR dealt with persistent rain, thunderstorms and lightning that delayed the event’s original green flag starting time at 7:46 p.m. ET on Saturday. With the weather forecast indicating that the rain would persist throughout Saturday evening, the announcement to postpone the event a day later to Sunday, August 28, was made not long after its original starting time. Live coverage of the event that will now occur on Sunday is scheduled to commence at 10 a.m. ET on CNBC, Peacock, NBC Sports App, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
When the regular-season finale at Daytona commences, Kyle Larson, winner of last weekend’s Cup event at Watkins Glen International and the reigning Cup Series champion, will lead the 37-car field to green flag from pole position, which was awarded to him based on a metric formula per NASCAR’s rulebook after rain canceled this weekend’s on-track qualifying session that was scheduled to occur on Friday, August 26. Joining him on the front row will be teammate Chase Elliott, the 2020 Cup Series champion who clinched this year’s regular-season title.
This weekend’s Cup event at Daytona serves as the 26th and final regular-season event of the 2022 season. Following the conclusion of the event, the 2022 Cup Series Playoff field that will comprise 16 competitors will be determined. Prior to the event, 14 competitors (Chase Elliott, Kyle Larson, Ross Chastain, Joey Logano, William Byron, Kevin Harvick, Denny Hamlin, Tyler Reddick, Christopher Bell, Chase Briscoe, Kyle Busch, Daniel Suarez, rookie Austin Cindric and Alex Bowman) have clinched spots for the Playoffs based on winning at least once throughout the regular-season stretch. Currently, Ryan Blaney and Martin Truex Jr. occupy the final two vacant spots for the Playoffs based on points, with Blaney being 25 points ahead of Truex and Truex retaining the 16th and final transfer spot to the Playoffs by 187 points over Erik Jones.
Names like Erik Jones, Aric Almirola, Austin Dillon, Bubba Wallace, Chris Buescher, Justin Haley, Michael McDowell, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Cole Custer, Brad Keselowski, rookie Harrison Burton, Ty Dillon and rookie Todd Gilliland are the competitors who are situated outside of the top-16 cutline entering Daytona, but are still in contention to make the Playoffs. Their hopes of making the Playoffs depends on winning the regular-season finale and potentially eliminating Blaney or Truex from Playoff contention.
Following this weekend’s regular-season finale at Daytona, the Playoffs are scheduled to commence at Darlington Raceway for the Cook Out Southern 500 next Sunday, September 4, at 6 p.m. ET on USA Network.
The 2022 Coke Zero Sugar 400 at Daytona is scheduled to occur on Sunday, August 28, at 10 a.m. ET on CNBC.
