The 2018 Daytona 500 was definitely one for the books! With the pace car driven by Peyton Manning, lots of crashes, including a crash-ending for Danica Patrick, and a meaningful win for Austin Dillon in the number three car in overtime!
Even though there were multiple crashes throughout each stage, the biggest one came in the last lap of the first stage. Ricky Stenhouse Jr tried a crazy move to block Ryan Blaney and caused a big old mess taking out some of the front-runners including Jimmie Johnson and Kyle Larson.
Danica Patrick in her final NASCAR race before retirement, went out in the same fashion she’s used to, in a crash right before the final stage of the race.
The big race ended up going into overtime where Austin Dillon went from third place with two laps to go, passed up Denny Hamlin and on the checkered flag Dillon goes low with a move to pass up Aric Almirola and win the whole thing!
Dillon, who now drives the number three car definitely made the original number three, Dale Earnhardt’s presence known by not only re-creating his celebration from his own Daytona win exactly 20 years ago to the date. This year’s Daytona 500 also happened to fall on the 17th anniversary of the late legend’s death.
All in all, it was an action-packed race that even the biggest NASCAR hater could enjoy, and a meaningful win for the number three team!
