DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Fifty-two lead modifications amongst 21 drivers. Solely three in-race cautions over the race’s first 198 laps after which three extra over the ultimate 13 laps, 10 run in additional time. A Daytona 500 winner who did not take the lead till that OT after which pulled into Victory Lane for the primary time in additional than 5 and a half years.

All of it reads like an unlikely confluence of racing occasions. A once-in-a-lifetime Halley’s Comet form of sighting. A NASCAR unicorn. However it’s not one of the above. Not at Daytona. Not in inventory automobile racing’s greatest race run on its greatest roulette wheel.

No, that spaghetti pile of closing-laps statistics and sheet steel has grow to be the Nice Modus Operandi of the Nice American Race. A couple of hours of calm adopted by a couple of laps of wacko adopted by a driver standing in Victory Lane who’s proud to be there however deep down, in the event that they’re being sincere, additionally form of cannot consider it.

“It looks like a dream, it actually does,” winner Ricky Stenhouse Jr. confessed as he acquired a conga line of hugs from a seemingly limitless variety of revelers from one-car, poor-but-proud JTG Daugherty Racing. “However I do know it is actual as a result of I understand how arduous everybody proper right here has labored. How arduous I’ve labored. This racetrack tonight has lastly given us the breaks we have been so near getting for therefore lengthy. Standing proper right here took so lengthy. However proper now, it was price all of it.”

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Price a private look ahead to Stenhouse of two,060 days. 5 years, seven months, 19 days. Practically 68 months. 100 ninety-nine races. That is how lengthy it had been since he’d gained a NASCAR Cup Sequence occasion, additionally at Daytona, {the summertime} 400-miler of July 1, 2017. That is solely his third win in a decade of attempting. For JTG Daughtery, the drought was even longer. The No. 47 automobile hadn’t been coated in confetti and champagne since August 10, 2014, a complete of three,116 days. That is solely their second trophy to take again to the race store. The most important single-race trophy that may be gained in NASCAR.

“We have at all times needed to take rather less into these weekly fights with these big-dollar groups and that is okay, that is who we’re, however there have been nights after we requested, ‘Can we maintain these lights on?'” group co-owner Tad Geschickter defined Sunday night time, standing alongside spouse Jodi. The couple moved their group up from the Xfinity Sequence to Cup forward of the 2009 Daytona 500, becoming a member of forces with former NBA All-Star Brad Daugherty (he began the day at Daytona however missed the celebration after feeling underneath the climate and flying residence). “Covid was actually tough on us. We’re sponsored by retailers, grocers, suppliers. Once they obtained squeezed, so did we. We would have liked breaks. We would have liked the taking part in subject to be leveled and now we have gotten that.”

They obtained it within the type of NASCAR’s Subsequent Gen automobile that debuted in 2022, just one a part of a slew of guidelines modifications applied by the sanctioning physique to assist groups reduce prices and maybe slender the hole between the far-flung monetary ends of the storage. That parity swept by way of the game one 12 months in the past with 19 totally different winners, essentially the most seen in 21 seasons.

Added to the crapshoot of superspeedway racing, plus the fixed reset button that the Daytona 500 has grow to be in current seasons, that stage taking part in subject changed into a showcase stage for Stenhouse and the No. 47 Chevy.

“We had been thirty fifth in qualifying on Wednesday and we completed sixteenth (out of 21 automobiles) in our qualifying race on Thursday,” Stenhouse recalled. “We had a pit highway rushing penalty early within the race right now and even after I was within the lead late, we had been operating low on gasoline, and I used to be consistently afraid that I used to be going to expire of gasoline. However then, it labored out!”

For him, sure. For everybody else, not a lot. Once more, that has grow to be the way in which of this place.

Previously dozen years, the Daytona 500 has averaged greater than 32 lead modifications per race. Previously eight races, the race has seen 4 last-lap passes for the lead after there had been solely 9 within the first 57 editions of the occasion. Previously seven races, a mean of 31 automobiles have been concerned in crashes within the Daytona 500, greater than three quarters of the sector, together with 30 on Sunday. The Daytona 500 polesitter has not gained the race since Dale Jarrett in 2000. The final driver to guide the race on the midway level and go on to win it was Davey Allison in 1992.

It is whole chaos. An evil beachside drive that appears decided to slam its doorways within the faces of NASCAR legends; former NASCAR champions Martin Truex Jr., Kyle Busch and Brad Keselowski mixed to guide 61 laps on Sunday however finally reached a mixed 0-for-48 of their Daytona 500 careers. However then it additionally likes to open that very same door for these in want. Say, a Mississippi driver who was as soon as earmarked for greatness at then-superpower Roush Fenway Racing after which seemingly tossed into motorsport purgatory.

Simply check out the previous three winners of this race. Stenhouse’s third-ever win was his first in 199 races. Final 12 months it was Austin Cindric, a rookie making his first-ever Cup Sequence begin. In 2021 it was Michael McDowell, incomes his first-ever win in his 357th profession begin.

“You anticipate chaos at Daytona, and also you at all times have, however today it does appear crazier than it is ever been. I do not suppose anybody can dispute that,” Stenhouse defined as his bathroom paper sponsor threw rolls round Victory Lane behind him.

“More often than not, that chaos that this place has grow to be, it bites you within the butt. You are within the wall. Within the grass. Wrecked and loading up and going residence. You begin considering it is by no means going to go your manner, particularly at this place and on this race.”

Then the 35-year-old turned, pointed to the spot on the large Harley J. Earl Trophy the place his identify might be engraved in sterling silver alongside the Corridor of Fame likes of Richard Petty, Cale Yarborough, Jeff Gordon … in addition to the gotta-search-them winners comparable to Pete Hamilton, Derrike Cope and Trevor Bayne.

“However typically you make your breaks, you catch some breaks, you make the best transfer on the proper time, and Daytona, it rewards you.”