DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Hendrick Motorsports driver William Byron holds the esteemed distinction of arriving in Daytona Beach this week as the defending DAYTONA 500 champion.
Should he pull off the victory in Sunday’s race, it would mark only the fifth time in the race’s 67-year history that a driver has won consecutive DAYTONA 500s.
That short list includes the sport’s all-time winningest driver, Richard Petty (1973-74), three-time series champion Cale Yarborough (1983-84), along with Sterling Marlin (1994-95) and Denny Hamlin (2019-2020). In Marlin’s case, he is the only driver ever to earn his first two career wins in the Daytona 500.
Byron acknowledged the magnitude of the prospect of earning a second consecutive win in the Great American Race, but the 27-year-old Charlotte native seemed ultra-confident in his No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports team’s ability to give it a good try.
“It’s a huge deal,” Byron said Wednesday during DAYTONA 500 Media Day at Daytona International Speedway. “This race is very difficult, the way this is structured nowadays and the way the drafting tracks are with this package. It is tough but I feel like just having consistency on these drafting tracks like we have the last few times we’ve raced on them, we’ve been able to be really good at them. It’s just figuring out those last couple of things.”
Furthermore, Byron added, “I feel like having experienced it the way it was last year really changed my perspective on the race as a whole, in a good way, obviously. I feel that’s created some more motivation to get another one. This race, it’s a lifetime achievement. It’s something people reference everywhere you go.
“It’s something that the first time in my career I’ve had something like that. It makes it cool, it makes it more special, because you can tell people care about the race.”
Source: Holly Cain | NASCAR Wire Service
