Overcoming a massive points deficit and a haunting history of wrecks, Ryan Preece silenced doubters by clinching his first Cup victory in the Coke Zero Sugar 400, snatching a dramatic berth in The Chase
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Ryan Preece just lived out the ultimate underdog story.
Heading into Saturday night at Daytona, Preece sat 31 points behind Shane van Gisbergen for the final spot in The Chase. He had never made the NASCAR postseason. He had never won a Cup Series points race. After 248 starts spread across nine seasons, the win column was still empty.
All of that changed in one night.
Preece needed every point he could get, and a win was the cleanest way to do it.
He delivered.
He finished eighth in Stage 1 for three bonus points, second in Stage 2 for nine more, and then closed it out with the victory. That added up to 67 points on the night. Van Gisbergen finished 28th after winning Stage 1, ending up with just 19 points. When the math settled, Preece had jumped 17 points ahead of SVG and stolen the last playoff spot. It was a 48-point turnaround in a single race.
To be fair, Preece did put himself in a difficult position. He was docked 25 points after an incident with Ty Gibbs at Texas Motor Speedway. Without the penalty, Preece would've been in The Chase with a lot more breathing room. Even with that said, he still found a way.
This is the kind of drama NASCAR has been chasing.
It wasn’t manufactured by some gimmick or forced by the system. It happened the old-fashioned way — on the track, under the lights, with everything on the line. One driver who needed it most went out and took it.
Preece has been overlooked for a long time. He’s bounced around, fought for every opportunity, and heard the same questions year after year. Yet when the moment finally came, he did something he hadn’t done in nearly a decade of trying: win a Cup race. And he did it at Daytona, of all places.
Daytona hasn’t exactly been kind to him over the years. Preece has been the victim of some of the nastiest flips and “take-offs to the moon” crashes the track has produced. The kind of wrecks that make you hold your breath.
Somehow, this was the place where he had the biggest night of his career.
The No. 60 team doesn’t even know what the future looks like. They currently don’t have a charter locked in for next season. None of that matters right now. They earned the right to go race for a championship, and that’s all that counts in this moment.
The racing itself helped create the story. NASCAR’s new downforce package played out well. Fuel-saving strategies, which have frustrated fans at drafting tracks for years, were greatly reduced. Drivers had to race more and calculate less. It made for better action and set the stage for a finish that felt earned.
If you’re a sucker for a good story, Saturday night delivered pure cinema.
A guy who had never won, never made the postseason, and had every reason to believe the door was closing finally kicked it open.
One night flipped everything.
Ryan Preece is in The Chase. He has a win.
And for the first time in a long time, the spotlight is exactly where it belongs — on a driver who refused to go away.
