DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - Michael McDowell stormed through a crash scene to win the Daytona 500, snapping an 0-for-357 streak in NASCAR Cup Series competition with a fiery pileup in his rearview mirror.
McDowell led just the final lap - maybe half of it, really - after Brad Keselowski turned fellow Team Penske driver Joey Logano as they jockeyed for the victory.
McDowell stayed flat in the gas and plowed past the two spinning cars to the lead, then won a three-wide drag race until NASCAR threw a race-ending caution.
It was mayhem behind McDowell in the Front Row Motorsports No. 34 Ford as a huge pack of cars could not avoid Keselowski and Logano. The collisions were one on top of another, flames erupting all over Daytona International Speedway as the race came to a close early Monday morning, nearly nine hours after it began.
McDowell, a 36-year-old journeyman from Arizona, was a 100-1 underdog at the start of the race and seemed in disbelief after taking his first checkered flag on NASCAR's top circuit.
"So many years just grinding it out hoping for an opportunity like this," said McDowell, whose only other NASCAR national series win came five years ago on the second-tier Xfinity circuit. "We're the Daytona 500 champions. I cannot believe this. Luckily was able to make it through."
AP photo by John Raoux / Michael McDowell celebrates in victory lane at Daytona International Speedway early Monday morning after winning the Daytona 500 by leading less than a lap to take the checkered flag in the season opener, earning his first NASCAR Cup Series win after more than 350 starts.A rain delay of almost six hours pushed the race into the night and under the lights, albeit without almost half the field. A 16-car collision just 15 laps into the race - moments before the rain - thinned the contenders and set up a showdown between Stewart-Haas Racing's Kevin Harvick and Joe Gibbs Racing's Denny Hamlin.
Hamlin and Harvick, who dueled throughout the 2020 regular season and much of the playoffs, had the two best cars at Daytona, but pit strategy ended Hamlin's shot at winning a record three years in a row at "The Great American Race."
Reigning Cup Series champion Chase Elliott finished second, 2018 Daytona 500 winner Austin Dillon was third and Harvick finished fourth. Hamlin was fifth after leading a race-high 98 laps.