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Behind the Scenes at the Daytona 500
By The Players' Tribune
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Four Contenders, Three Races, One Champion.
The 2022 NASCAR season got underway on Sunday with the 64th running of the Daytona 500. Rookie Austin Cindric was the big winner, earning his first Cup series victory by fending off three different final-lap challengers — including a hard-charging Bubba Wallace, who finished second by an agonizing 0.036 seconds. It was the second near-miss in the 500 for Wallace, the runner-up in 2018 by 0.206 seconds. Twice now, he’s just run out of track. The Players’ Tribune was at Daytona Superspeedway all weekend, embedding with Hendrick Motorsports driver William Byron and capturing an inside-the-oval look at the 48 hours leading up to the Great American Race. Byron’s 500 ended early, with a crash on Lap 63, but the glimpse of his life on the Daytona backstretch — as well as of the scene that surrounded him — made for some indelible images. Frozen moments from a turbocharged weekend that’s all about speed.
Photographs by Jonathan Ferrey for The Players' Tribune; Audio courtesy of INDYCAR.
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CLARA MOKRI/The Players' Tribune
The Only Way Is Through
By Anthony Joshua
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