NASCAR: Mike Wallace not approved for Daytona 500 bid

NASCAR competition officials confirmed Monday that driver Mike Wallace is not approved for his previously announced attempt to qualify for this year’s Daytona 500.

MBM Motorsports had announced Jan. 2 that the 65-year-old Wallace would drive the team’s No. 66 Ford in its bid for the “Great American Race” (Feb. 16, 2:30 p.m. ET, FOX, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

RELATED: Daytona 500 weekend schedule

For each driver approval request, NASCAR considers recent racing activity and performance as primary factors for consideration.

Wallace’s most recent NASCAR Cup Series start came in the Daytona 500 in 2015, when he drove a Jay Robinson-owned entry to a 36th-place finish. He last competed in a national series event in 2020, when he drove three races for JD Motorsports in the Xfinity Series.

Because Wallace has not raced on an intermediate or larger race track since 2015, at this time he is not approved to race at the NASCAR Cup Series level.

Wallace has three career victories at Daytona International Speedway in three different series. He prevailed in an ARCA Menards Series race at the World Center of Racing in 1994, then added wins there in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series (2000) and Xfinity Series (2004).