For 20 years, Dale Earnhardt tried and failed to win the Daytona 500. The seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champion had come agonizingly close, finishing runner-up four times before finally conquering the Great American Race in 1998.
Now, 27 years later, another Richard Childress Racing driver finds himself in a eerily similar position.
Kyle Busch—a two-time Cup champion and the winningest driver across NASCAR’s three national series (231 victories)—has never won the Daytona 500. And after enduring a winless 2024 season, the stars seem to be aligning for him to rewrite history in 2025.
But as Busch himself pointed out—this isn’t 1998 anymore.
Why Busch’s Daytona 500 Struggles Feel Like Earnhardt’s
Busch’s frustration at Daytona is well-documented. He’s been in position to win multiple times, only for bad luck, crashes, or NASCAR’s overtime rules to ruin his chances.
🚨 The biggest parallel? The 2023 Daytona 500.
- Busch led the field with two laps to go, seemingly on his way to victory.
- A caution forced an overtime restart, wiping away his lead.
- Ricky Stenhouse Jr., who was 7th at the time, surged to the win.
Busch, frustrated beyond belief, didn’t hold back post-race:
“I think this is the first time I led lap 200, so I wish it was 1998 rules. But no, it’s just part of the course. I come down here every year just to find out when and where I’m going to crash and what lap I’ll come out of the Care Center.”
Dale Earnhardt won the 1998 Daytona 500 under the old rules, where the leader at the white flag under caution was declared the winner. Had those rules still been in place, Busch would already be a Daytona 500 champion.
But this is the Next-Gen era, and Busch believes modern NASCAR has made winning even tougher.
The Next-Gen Car: NASCAR’s Equalizer Hurting Busch?
Unlike Earnhardt’s prime years, when teams could engineer speed advantages, NASCAR’s Next-Gen car has leveled the playing field.
Busch told FOX Sports’ Bob Pockrass:
“It’s just tough. With all the cars being more equal, you’re fighting for hundredths or thousandths of inches.”
📊 Proof of the Next-Gen Era’s Close Racing:
- 3 of the 10 closest finishes in NASCAR history have come in the Next-Gen era.
- 7 of the 10 closest finishes of all time have happened in the 21st century.
When Earnhardt won in 1998, he didn’t have to worry about photo finishes or late-race chaos like Busch does today.
Can Busch Finally Break Through in 2025?
Busch enters the 2025 season with enormous pressure.
- He’s on a 57-race winless streak.
- He’s in a contract year with RCR.
- He finished 15th in the Clash and 10th in his Daytona Duel, showing solid speed but not dominance.
Even Busch himself sees the eerie parallel with Earnhardt.
“You’d certainly like to hope so. Twenty years of trying. There was another storied racer of the past that won on his 20th try, and that was a pretty big deal. He was a former RCR driver as well, so it’d certainly be nice to win that race and do it with RCR in the No. 8 Zone Chevrolet.”
Daytona Doesn’t Care About Fate—Only Execution
Some believe Busch’s time has come. Others know Daytona doesn’t care about what should happen—it does whatever it wants.
📍 Tony Stewart—one of NASCAR’s greatest—never won the Daytona 500.
📍 Trevor Bayne—on his first attempt—stole a win at age 20.
Busch has won everywhere else, but this is the one crown jewel still missing.
Will 2025 be the year he finally breaks the curse, or will Daytona deliver another heartbreak?
