Daytona 500: How NASCAR's signature event sets its field

FOX NASCAR Insider

The Daytona 500 field consists of 40 cars, with 36 spots reserved for drivers of teams that own charters, which is NASCAR’s version of a franchise. So there are only four spots available to drivers whose cars do not have a charter, commonly referred to as “open” cars.

The 36 drivers who are automatically in with a charter are as follows: Aric Almirola, AJ Allmendinger, Christopher Bell, Ryan Blaney, Alex Bowman, Chase Briscoe, Chris Buescher, Harrison Burton, Kyle Busch, William Byron, Austin Cindric, Ross Chastain, Austin Dillon, Ty Dillon, Chase Elliott, Ty Gibbs, Todd Gilliland, Noah Gragson, Justin Haley, Denny Hamlin, Kevin Harvick, Riley Herbst, Erik Jones, Brad Keselowski, Corey LaJoie, Kyle Larson, Joey Logano, Michael McDowell, B.J. McLeod, Ryan Preece, Tyler Reddick, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Daniel Suarez, Martin Truex Jr., Bubba Wallace and Cody Ware.

There are currently six drivers who will vie for the four open spots: Conor Daly, Austin Hill, Jimmie Johnson, Travis Pastrana, Chandler Smith and Zane Smith.

Any open team wishing to enter the Feb. 19 race (2:30 p.m. ET on FOX) must do so by Wednesday, the first day the garage opens.

The first step — after getting through technical inspection — is single-car qualifying Wednesday night, where each driver does one lap, with the top 10 from those single-car runs advancing to a second round to determine their final order ahead of the rest. The single-car runs set the front row of the Daytona 500, as well as the lineups for the Daytona 500 qualifying races — “the duels” — on Thursday night.

The charter teams are evenly split among the two duels, as are the non-charter cars. The first duel has the first, third, fifth, etc., chartered cars and the first, third, etc., open cars from single-car qualifying. The second duel has second, fourth, sixth, etc. chartered cars and the same for open cars.

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The highest-finishing open car in each duel makes the Daytona 500. The final two spots are the two remaining open drivers who were fastest in single-car qualifying.

So this is what we’ll know Wednesday night: The top-two open drivers in single-car qualifying know they are guaranteed a spot in the race because even if they’re not the top open car in their duel, they can fall back on their time. The third and fourth open cars in single-car qualifying know there is a possibility their times get them in (depending on who is the top open car in their duel), and any open driver who is ranked outside the top-four open cars has no other path into the 500 other than being the best open car in the duel.

The starting order for the 500 is set this way:

The front row is the top-two cars from single-car qualifying.
Rows 2-19 are set by the duels, with the first duel filling the inside row by order of finish and the second duel filling the outside row by order of finish (taking into account that the top-two cars from single-car qualifying already are in the front row and any open driver who didn’t make the 500 field is excluded).
Row 20 consists of the last two open cars to make it on speed.

Bob Pockrass covers NASCAR for FOX Sports. He has spent decades covering motorsports, including the past 30 Daytona 500s, with stints at ESPN, Sporting News, NASCAR Scene magazine and The (Daytona Beach) News-Journal. Follow him on Twitter @bobpockrass, and sign up for the FOX Sports NASCAR Newsletter with Bob Pockrass.

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