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Joey Logano wins Daytona 500
- Updated: February 23, 2015
Joey Logano, who used to be derisively referred to as “Sliced Bread,” proved to be the greatest thing at Sunday’s Daytona 500. The 24-year-old driver continued to build on his success over the past two seasons with the biggest win of his career, which is now, remarkably, in its eighth year at the Sprint Cup level.
Logano took the lead with nine laps to go, but another driver spun out with three laps left, bringing out a red flag and setting up a furious finish. Logano was able to hold off Kevin Harvick, the 2014 NASCAR Sprint Cup champion, and Dale Earnhardt Jr., who won the Daytona 500 last year, getting some help when a caution froze the field on the final lap.
Jeff Gordon, in what he has called his final Daytona 500, had pole position and led for the most laps, 87, including 77 of the first 100. But he got bogged down about two-thirds of the way through the race, then got caught in a last-lap crash and limped home in 33rd place.
“Daytona 500, oh my God! Are you kidding me?” Logano exclaimed after the race. “I was so nervous the whole race.”
Logano first competed in NASCAR’s top circuit in 2008, at the age of 18, with his first full season coming a year later. His precocious talent had him ticketed for instant stardom — and caused muttering among some veterans, including the “Sliced Bread” moniker — especially when he won at Loudon, N.H., midway through the 2009 campaign.
But a funny thing happened to Logano quickly becoming the Next Big Thing: the process quickly bogged down. He had no wins in 2010 and 2011, then just one, with just one other top-five finish, in 2012.
By that point, the team with which he had starts, Joe Gibbs Racing, had seen enough, and he got dropped. Penske Racing picked him up for the 2013 season, and that’s when Logano’s prospects started brightening again.
He only had one victory in 2013, but he also had 11 t0p-five and 19 top-10 finishes. Logano truly broke out last year, with five wins, 16 top-five finishes and the fourth spot in the final Sprint Cup rankings.
On Sunday, Logano further justified Roger Penske’s faith, giving the legendary racing owner his second Daytona 500 win. The triumph was just the latest evidence that things are really coming together for Logano, who got married in December.
His new wife, Brittany Baca, said she picked Dec. 13 for their nuptials on the logic that Logano would have an easy time remembering that date: 12/13/14. Years from now, it seems likely that the former prodigy will also have no trouble recalling 2/22/15: The day he fulfilled his considerable promise by fending off NASCAR’s elite for its biggest prize.
