No matter what happens on Thursday night, David Ragan and Anthony Alfredo will race on Sunday in the Daytona 500.
Meanwhile, seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champion and recently inducted Hall of Famer Jimmie Johnson must race his way in against Kaz Grala, BJ McLeod and JJ Yeley. Only two of the four will advance into The Great American Race while the other two will be sent home.
That’s the drama of the Daytona Duel qualifying races.
Barring a really remarkable set of circumstances, there will be no drama on Thursday night for Joey Logano and Michael McDowell, who qualified on the front row for NASCAR’s biggest race and have very little to race for until Sunday.
Sure, Thursday could effectively be a practice sessions of sort in advance of Sunday but there are few tangible reasons for them to risk crashing their primary car and also giving up the front row.
Everyone else will be racing for their starting spots for Sunday, something that also doesn’t have a ton of value for a 500-mile race where everyone will be shuffled up and down the running order at various points of the race.
The race to make the race
Ragan and Alfredo made the race based on their qualifying speed.
Two open cars, those not protected by an ownership charter, make the race on speed through qualifying while the other open cars must race their way in. However, there is caveat, as Johnson can still make the race two ways.
He’s in the first of two Twin 125s, and if he is the best finishing open driver, he makes the field and Alfredo would make it in on time. Johnson could also make it in based on his qualifying time if Alfredo, Ragan or McLeod advance based on their finishing result on Sunday since he was the third fastest open driver in qualifying.
“I had higher expectations for sure, but we are lumped right there with the other Toyotas,” said Johnson, who is seeking to become the first inducted Hall of Famer to compete in a Cup race. “The 43 (Erik Jones) car got a little more out of it, so I wish we had a bit more out of ours, but it is what it is.
“We will go out and race hard tomorrow night and try to make the 500.”
He’s never had to race his way into the Daytona 500 as he was either protected by points, a charter or his qualifying speed.
He conceded that he was nervous.
“Of course,” Johnson said. “Much more nervous now. I thought we were going to be in a little bit better position than this, but it is what it is. We will go to work.”
Johnson has a really good chance as his car is a fully funded Toyota entry and all he has to do is defeat a part-time No. 44 NY Racing car driven by JJ Yeley that didn’t have a driver until Wednesday morning and missed the entire 2023 season.
He likely will just need to avoid running into any problems or suffering a mechanical failure.
“I’ve never been in this position, so I don’t know,” Johnson said of his strategic approach. “I came down here mentally prepared to race my way in if that was required. I’m well studied. I spent a lot of time working on the environment of the Duels and the way the race will unfold. Just get out there and race hard and see how it unfolds.”
Yeley can only advance if he finishes ahead of both Alfredo and Johnson.
The second duel features McLeod, Kaz Grala and Ragan. Grala, who was unable to turn a lap on Thursday and will start at the back, must be the highest finishing open drive to advance into Sunday.
McLeod can advance by either being the best finishing open driver, ahead of Ragan and Grala, which would also lock in Johnson or advance if either Johnson or Alfredo is the best finishing open driver in duel one.
Grala may have an ace in the hole in Front Row Motorsports teammate Michael McDowell in his duel, who could theoretically make pushing him towards the front his sole responsibility.
“That will be a part of it,” McDowell said. “It will be very important to get that 36 in the race tomorrow night. Anything that we can do to help him do that, we’re going to try to do for a lot of reasons.
“One is three is better than two when it comes down to needing teammates and working together at the end of these races. Unfortunately had a little mechanical issue on that 36 car, but it’s going to have plenty of speed. We just need to make sure that we do everything we can to help him get in. That’s another variable that we’ll talk about tonight.”
Stone cold locks
Ragan only locked in over Johnson by .123 of a second, which is way closer than 27th overall to 35th looks, and the former two-race Cup winner knew it too.
“Well, initially I thought, ‘Man, we’re cutting this way too close,'” Ragan said. “I felt like we’d have a really fast race car, and we do. I really wasn’t expecting that lap from Anthony. That was a great lap for him and that team. Congratulations to those guys.
“I didn’t have a chance to beat Jimmie Johnson too often in my career when he and I were running week in, week out. I’ll take the small victories when I can.
“That just shows you how close the competition is. All these teams work hard on all the details. Every 10th, half of a 10th mean something. To be able to get locked in on pole night is really special. We’ve still got a lot of work in front of us to have some speed to go contend for a win.”
Alfredo was 20th overall, a mega lap, which shouldn’t be a surprise because the Beard Motorsports No. 62 is a Richard Childress Racing affiliate.
For Alfredo, it’s a second chance to race in the Daytona 500, but his first real effort in the race.
“I know you mentioned I have raced in the Daytona 500 in 2021,” Alfredo said. “That was during the pandemic. It was super weird. There was no Media Day, there weren’t many fans, we didn’t get to engage with many people. We didn’t have the hype and camaraderie around it. I don’t think I really got to truly appreciate what this event means from a driver perspective.”
The Front Row
Speaking of that 2021 pandemic era race, it was won by Michael McDowell, and it’s a race people often forget because there were so few fans and a completely closed off garage.
McDowell will most likely start the race from the outside pole and his No. 34 Front Row Motorsports team never had a doubt, even if the driver did.
“Yes, it did surprise me,” McDowell said. “If you asked my crew chief, Travis Peterson, he wouldn’t have been surprised. We were actually joking a lot today because we put a lot of emphasis into having as much speed as we could build into our Daytona 500 car down here.
“We always talk about it like, ‘Oh, yeah, we’ll see where we stack up.’ Usually we’ll even do a little whiteboard pick of where we think we’re going to qualify. Superspeedway qualifying typically hasn’t been a strength for us. We haven’t worried too much about it because our cars always race really well.
“But Travis today, he was like, ‘This is everything I have. If we don’t qualify well today, I am done with superspeedway racing qualifying. I’m not putting any more effort into it anymore.’”
Well, that worked out.
Logano ultimately denied him what would have been his first career Cup Series pole, too.
“I know. What a turd.”
Logano was a lucky turd.
“I was a lucky jockey that was behind the wheel that got to drive that one today,” Logano said. “It’s neat. Obviously really cool to start on the front row for the Daytona 500. Never done that before. Never been even close. So, this is something really neat to be able to experience.”
It’s even neater for Ford to finally defeat Chevrolet and Hendrick Motorsports.
Entering Wednesday night, Hendrick had claimed six consecutive front row starting spot. It also had three consecutive front row lockouts. The team had also won the pole for this race eight times in nine years.
Did the No. 22 team, Team Penske or Ford talk about it?
“I mean, the whole sport talks about it, right,” Logano said. “I had the TV on before we went and qualified. That’s what they’re talking about on FOX. What was it, seven straight poles, seven years in a row, the 48 car was up there. Geez, man, some of those stats are unbelievable. I didn’t realize all that was happening. I just got used to what it was, but I didn’t think it was for that long.
“Yeah, it was nice to be able to break their streak. It’s something that it’s an incredible run that they were on. Glad we finally caught up.”
And in the same way McDowell had his marching orders, so too did Logano, and its what he wanted to hear.
“Yeah, it was a two-second conversation in Victory Lane a minute ago with Paul, ‘We’re racing, right’ and he said ‘Yeah’ and I said ‘Okay.’
“The good thing is Paul and I both have the same approach to speedway racing, where we’re going racing. Something happens, it happens. It’s not worth wrecking it, but you get the same attitude whether we qualify 5th or 15th. You don’t want to go to your backup car no matter what you do.
“I want to make sure our car is driving good. We have the new Dark Horse Mustang that goes fast by itself, but we want to make sure it’s tuned right, get everything out of it. We’re going to go out there and be smart, but we’re going to race ’em. There’s a trophy and 10 points. We’re going to race ’em.”
Matt Weaver is a Motorsports Insider for Sportsnaut. Follow him on Twitter.