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NASCAR driver Joey Logano won his first Daytona 500 10 years ago but didn’t realize it would be his last trip to Victory Lane during his sport’s biggest race.
Every year pretty much since his 2015 win at age 24, Logano feels like he’s on the verge of his next one.
After all, he’s been right there more times than he’d care to count.
“I feel like it’s with a couple little things changing, we’re sitting here with four of them,” he recently told the Orlando Sentinel. “I get more frustrated than I do proud of being close.”
Logano once again should be in the thick of it Feb. 16 when the Daytona 500 kicks off the 2025 regular season.
The 34-year-old is coming off his third NASCAR Cup Series title, something just Jimmie Johnson and Tony Stewart have done since 2000 and only 10 drivers have accomplished in the sport’s history.
“It is really special but I’m still in the middle of it,” he said. “At some point I’ll look back and think, ‘Man, that’s really cool.’ But we’re far from being done.”
Logano, a 36-time Cup Series winner, could further cement his status among NASCAR’s elite with another Daytona 500 victory — something several iconic drivers including Stewart and Kyle Busch failed to accomplish even once.
Logano’s dogged pursuit comes a year after he won the pole for the first time and led a personal-best 45 laps before a massive 23-car crash ended his day on Lap 191.
A year earlier, he finished runner-up to Ricky Stenhouse Jr., who won a record 212-lap affair under caution after Logano at one point led during the final lap.
“[If] the caution came out a second-and-a-half before it did, we would have won the Daytona 500,” Logano said.
In 2021, Logano led Brad Keselowski entering the final lap but when Logano looked to hold off Keselowski, the two cars collided and Michael McDowell raced ahead for a stunning victory.
During Denny Hamlin’s 2019 victory, Logano finished fourth when he felt McDowell, also driving a Ford Mustang, failed to give him a late-race push. McDowell later watched replays, spoke to Logano and Ford executives, and said he likely erred.
Add it to the list of close calls for Logano, who hopes his fortunes improve during a race he drove for the first time in 2009 when he crashed early and finished dead last in the 43rd spot.
Then a 19-year-old phenom driving for Joe Gibbs Racing, Logano won just twice in four seasons before he was dropped by Gibbs and landed with Roger Penske, another Hall of Fame owner.
“I needed that reality check to learn about myself, to learn how to prepare, to learn how to go to work,” said Logano, who enters his 17th Cup Series ready to work at again winning the race that continues to elude him — and consume him.
“There’s been quite a few times I’ve led the white-flag lap, but not the checkered-flag lap,” he recently told the Sentinel. “And that’s frustrating”
Edgar Thompson can be reached at egthompson@orlandosentinel.com.
Up next …
Daytona 500
When: Feb. 16, 2:30 p.m.
TV: FOX
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