Livescore
What a night for two of NASCAR’s oldest families in the Coke Zero Sugar 400 Saturday, when Harrison Burton took the checkered flag for Wood Brothers Racing.
Burton survived a night of wild crashes, then pulled ahead of race leader Kyle Busch on the last lap, claiming the 100th NASCAR Cup Series win for the legendary Wood Brothers Racing team. It was the team’s 10th victory in the summer race at Daytona.
“That’s our eighth decade of winning NASCAR races,” said Len Wood. “That’s what I’m most proud of.”
The team has won the Daytona 500 five times, including a 2011 win by rookie Trevor Bayne in his first Cup race.
It was the first Cup Series win for Burton, the son of former driver Jeff Burton, an NBC commentator who might have broken his own speed record rushing down from the booth to greet his son in the infield.
“I wanted to do everything for the Wood Brothers that I could,” said the 23-year-old race winner, after taking a ride with the checkered flag rippling out of the car window. “They’ve given me an amazing opportunity in life.”
What’s the history of the Wood Brothers at Daytona International Speedway?
Burton becomes the 21st driver to earn a win with the Wood Brothers, the oldest continually racing team in NASCAR. No other NASCAR team has had 10 wins in the 400.
Brothers Glen and Leonard Wood founded the team in 1953. The late Glen Wood drove in the races on the sand on Daytona Beach, starting in 1953, said his son Eddie, during a news conference in the wee hours of the morning Sunday after a Victory Lane celebration at Daytona International Speedway. Glen Wood also competed in the inaugural Daytona 500, the year Speedway opened in 1959.
“These races are so hard to win,” Wood said. “I don’t really have the words.”
“There’s nothing bigger than winning at Daytona,” he said. “This is my favorite track. Winning here is bigger to me than winning somewhere else.”
“Harrison, he’s done such a great job tonight. I mean missing those wrecks,” he said.
“It just means so much to our team to get that 100th win,” said Len Wood, also a son of Glen Wood.
For team president Jon Wood, Len Wood’s son and the family’s third generation in racing, it was a “surreal” experience to be in Victory Lane at Daytona.
The team had one of the lowest of low moments in Daytona in 2016, Wood said. The team sat in a news conference to discuss not getting a charter when NASCAR launched its charter system. “We had to come here and face the music, and say, I think we’ll be OK and we are,” Wood said. “You’re going to make me cry and I don’t cry.”
“That’s the part that’s just so surreal,” he said, “sitting in the same seat thinking of where we were and where we are now.”
Wood said it was “really cool to see the caliber of people” who came over to congratulate his family, noting that his father had briefly stepped away from the news conference to take a call from Jim France, chief executive officer of NASCAR, and son of founder Bill France Sr.
Jeff Burton said NBC still regularly airs clips about the historic team’s racing successes.
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Jeff Burton talks family’s history at Daytona International Speedway
Burton’s family also has had a long history in Daytona, Jeff Burton said. “This has been important for us.”
More than an hour after his son’s emotional victory, he said he was still trying to get his thoughts together.
This was his son’s first Cup Series win, but the third Cup Series win at Daytona for the Burton family. Jeff Burton won the 400 in 2000. His brother, Ward, won the 2002 Daytona 500. Harrison also won an ARCA Series race at the track in February 2019.
“Harrison has won a ton of races at New Smyrna Speedway,” Jeff Burton said. “When he was young, I was still racing here and he was racing over there, so I would practice and go over there and watch him race.”
For the 23-year-old Burton, Saturday night’s victory was a parting gift of sorts. It was announced earlier this year that Burton would be replaced as the team’s driver at the end of the season.
“To get them 100 on my way out is amazing,” Burton said after the race. “I wish it came sooner so I didn’t get fired (laughing), but it’s amazing.”
“Like I said, I just felt worried that I would leave the Wood Brothers with a lot of regret that I had three years to get their 100th win,” said Burton, who at this point, hasn’t yet secured a ride for the 2025 season.
A night for iconic NASCAR families
In one other nod to legendary families on Saturday, Richard Petty, winningest driver in NASCAR history, and his family, including his son Kyle, served as the race’s grand marshals and gave the starting command.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: NASCAR: Harrison Burton grabs 100th win for Wood Brothers Racing
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