Daytona 500 Pick 2027: Tyler Reddick and the Record Book at Daytona
Welcome to the Happy Hour Racing Track Preview - where we hand you the numbers, the history and a pick before the green flag. The 2026 Cup season is over, so this one is a between-races feature: a full statistical profile of the track that starts every season.
The Short Version
The 69th running of the Daytona 500 is set for Sunday, Feb. 21, 2027, 200 laps and 500 miles around the 2.5-mile superspeedway, live on FOX. Tyler Reddick comes in as the defending winner after passing Chase Elliott just before the stripe on the last lap in February 2026. Daytona is the one race on the calendar where a 35th-place car can win, and the 2026 edition proved it with a record 65 lead changes. Here is the full record book, plus the driver the data points to.
My Pick to Win
Tyler Reddick - No. 45, 23XI Racing
He had the best superspeedway average finish in the Cup field in 2026 at 10.7, and he has finished first and second in the last two Daytona 500s.
The Track and Why It Races the Way It Does
Daytona is 2.5 miles around with 31 degrees of banking in the corners and 18 degrees through the tri-oval. That banking is steep enough that the cars never really lift. Drivers run wide open almost the entire lap, which means the race is not decided by who can drive the deepest into a corner. It is decided by who has help.
That is the whole trick of a superspeedway. Air resistance, not horsepower, sets the speed limit here. A car running alone punches a hole in the air by itself and goes slower. A line of cars nose-to-tail shares that work, so the whole line goes faster than any one of them could alone. That is drafting, and it is why a pack of 20 cars can reel in a leader who looked gone a lap earlier.
NASCAR changed the superspeedway rules mid-2026 to lean into that. The rear spoiler came down from seven inches to four, the tapered spacer was cut to 27/32 of an inch, and horsepower dropped from roughly 510 to about 465. Less downforce and less power lets a single car build a bigger run on the pack instead of just locking bumpers behind it. That package debuted at Daytona in August 2026 and ran again at Talladega in October. NASCAR has not locked in the 2027 specification yet, so treat those numbers as the current baseline rather than a promise.
Past Winners and the Record Book
Richard Petty still owns this race with seven wins, a number nobody has threatened in forty years. Cale Yarborough has four. Bobby Allison, Dale Jarrett, Jeff Gordon and Denny Hamlin have three apiece. The closest finish in race history is still Hamlin over Martin Truex Jr. in 2016 by 0.010 of a second, and the youngest winner is still Trevor Bayne, who was 20 years and one day old in 2011.
The last ten runnings tell you how little the resume matters here. Michael McDowell won in 2021 after more than 350 career starts without a victory. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. won in 2023 for a single-car team. Only two drivers have gone back-to-back in that stretch: Hamlin in 2019 and 2020, and William Byron in 2024 and 2025.
Here is the piece that matters for the pick. Tyler Reddick was genuinely bad at this race for three straight years, and then something flipped:
| Year | Start | Finish | Laps Led |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | 26 | 1 | 1 |
| 2025 | 11 | 2 | 0 |
| 2024 | 3 | 29 | 0 |
| 2023 | 26 | 39 | 0 |
| 2022 | 15 | 35 | 0 |
Tyler Reddick, Daytona 500 results. Source: NASCAR official race results.
Drivers to Watch Heading Into 2027
Kyle Larson closed 2026 as a three-time Cup champion and won Talladega in October. Ryan Blaney won the Homestead finale and led 171 laps at Atlanta in July, which is drafting-track speed even when the finishes have not followed. And Ryan Preece broke through at Daytona in August 2026 for his first career Cup win in his 249th start, which is exactly the kind of story this track keeps producing.
It's legendary. It's the #DAYTONA500.
- Daytona International Speedway (@DAYTONA) November 13, 2026
My Pick to Win the 2027 Daytona 500
If you are already searching Daytona 500 picks 2027, Daytona 500 predictions or Tyler Reddick odds Daytona 2027, here is the case in four numbers. Reddick ran six superspeedway points races in 2026 and averaged a 10.7 finish, the best of any contender we checked. His median superspeedway result was sixth. He won two of those six, the Daytona 500 and Atlanta in February. And he led the Cup Series with six wins in 2026 while finishing fifth in the final standings.
The honest caveat: this race ignores form more than any other. Reddick finished 35th, 39th and 29th in the three Daytona 500s before his two straight top-two runs, and he was 37th at Talladega in the fall. Nobody is safe in the pack. But if you want one name for NASCAR picks at Daytona, or a DFS core for the Daytona 500, the data says the defending winner with the best drafting-track average in the field. That is a prediction, not a guarantee.
Who Else Could Win?
Ricky Stenhouse Jr. had the second-best superspeedway average in 2026 at 12.5, with a second at Daytona in February, a fifth in August and a third at Talladega in October. He is the 2023 Daytona 500 winner and he never gets talked about.
William Byron is the only active driver with two Daytona 500 trophies, and he closed 2026 with a second-place run at Talladega in October after a quiet drafting season.
Joey Logano led 63 laps across the six superspeedway races in 2026. He puts himself in position to win every single time, which also explains the wrecks.
The Bottom Line
Daytona is the only race where a driver can run 35th all afternoon, get one good push on the last lap and become a champion for life. That is exactly how Tyler Reddick won it in 2026, starting 26th and leading precisely one lap. The 2027 Daytona 500 is Sunday, Feb. 21, and the countdown is already on.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who wins the Daytona 500 in 2027?
Our pick is defending winner Tyler Reddick, who posted the best superspeedway average finish among the Daytona NASCAR favorites in 2026 at 10.7 and has finished first and second in the last two runnings.
Is Tyler Reddick good at Daytona?
He is now. After three straight finishes of 29th or worse from 2022 through 2024, he was second in the 2025 Daytona 500 and won the 2026 race on the final lap.
What time does the 2027 Daytona 500 start?
The race is Sunday, Feb. 21, 2027. NASCAR has not published the green-flag time yet, but the Daytona 500 traditionally goes green in the mid-afternoon Eastern.
What channel is the Daytona 500 on?
FOX carries the Daytona 500, with radio coverage on the Motor Racing Network.
Gear Up for Speedweeks
Fourteen weeks is a long time to wait. If you want something Daytona on before Speedweeks gets here, these are in stock right now:
- Daytona 500 Sublimated Race Trophy Logo Car T-Shirt
- Daytona 500 Vintage Unstructured Blue Racing Hat
- Daytona 500 Sublimated Trophy Structured Black Hat
- Tyler Reddick Trucker Mesh Hat for the pick
- William Byron Back-to-Back Daytona 500 Champion Hoodie
Everything else is at happyhourracing.com, and if you would rather get the winner's shirt without thinking about it, the win shirt subscription handles that for you.
