XFINITY: Daniel Dye collected in early backstretch stack-up at Daytona
by Brock Beard / LASTCAR.info Editor-in-Chief
SCREENSHOT: TheCW Sports
Daniel Dye picked up the 1st last-place finish of his NASCAR XFINITY Series career in Saturday’s United Rentals 300 at the Daytona International Speedway when his #10 Champion Container Chevrolet was involved in a multi-car accident after 5 of 126 laps.
The finish came in Dye’s 13th series start. In the XFINITY Series’ last-place rankings, it was the 75th for the #10, the 404th from a crash, and the 655th for Chevrolet. Across NASCAR’s top three series, it was the 136th for the #10, the 1,405th from a crash, and the 1,974th for Chevrolet.
While still very early in a NASCAR career that has yet to truly astonish, the 21-year-old from Florida has attracted a surprising amount of attention. In 2021, he earned his lone ARCA Menards Series East win at Berlin. In 2022, he was a close runner-up to Nick Sanchez in the series standings. And in 2023, he followed Sanchez to the Truck Series, where the pair competed for Rookie of the Year. Dye did all this driving for the now-defunct GMS Racing, aided by the backing of his father Randy, a businessman and philanthropist.
After a lackluster 2023, Dye and his backers moved to the Bill McAnally team for 2024. There, he earned his first pole at Atlanta and a pair of top-five finishes, including a runner-up to teammate Christian Eckes at Nashville.
This same rapid ascent has thrust Dye into the XFINITY Series, where two years ago he was already making races for Alpha Prime Racing. It was with this team that Dye finished a surprising 17th in his series debut at the treacherous Texas track. The net year, Dye landed a part-time effort in Kaulig Racing’s “all-star” #10 entry, where he soon earned his first top-ten finish in Iowa, then improved with a 7th at Indianapolis.
That leads us to this year, where Dye makes another big jump with the Kaulig team. Not even four years after his win at Berlin, Dye is now a full-time competitor in the NASCAR XFINITY Series.
Dye was among the 41 drivers entered to attempt Saturday’s 38-car field for the season opener. He ranked mid-pack in practice, taking 23rd, then despite a rained-out qualifying session (after 12 drivers took time) secured 12th on the grid based on Owner Points earned by Van Gisbergen’s #97 effort in 2024. Sent home by the rain were Carson Ware, whose #74 NASCAR SpeedPark / Save22 Chevrolet overheated on his qualifying attempt before the rains came, plus C.J. McLaughlin in the #92 Main Street Auto Chevrolet, and J.J. Yeley, shut out of both races he attempted this weekend, this time as the late-announced driver of RSS Racing’s #29 Ford.
Securing the 38th and final starting spot was Jordan Anderson, back behind the wheel of his own part-time entry, the #32 Volpi Chevrolet. He’d be joined by three other drivers who incurred pre-race penalties for unapproved adjustments: 27th-place Anthony Alfredo in the #42 Dude Wipes Chevrolet, 28th-place Parker Retzlaff in the #4 Visual Pak / Rewind It 10 Chevrolet, and 33rd-place Ryan Truex in the #24 BB Printing Co. Toyota. NASCAR instructed these three drivers to split between both lanes, placing Alfredo and Truex behind the low lane and Retzlaff at the end of the outside.
By the time the field took the green flag, intervals indicated the 38th-place qualified Anderson had already moved to 31st. Alpha Prime Racing teammates Brennan Poole in the #44 Macc Door Systems Chevrolet and Caesar Bacarella in the #45 Mongoose Power Solutions Chevrolet surrendered 18th and 36th to join teammate Retzlaff. Also falling back were both Joey Gase Motorsports cars of 16th-place Greg Van Alst in the #35 CB Fabricating Chevrolet and Gase himself in the #53 NCPC Race Against Crime Chevrolet, set to start 16th and 37th. Kris Wright also gave up 17th in Our Motorsports’ #5 First National Bank Corp Chevrolet.
The penalized #24 of Truex was last across the stripe, 4.415 seconds back of the leader to Bacarella’s 4.061. By the end of Lap 1, Truex had caught and passed Bacarella, who now battled the two Gase cars. By Lap 4, Bacarella’s spotter reminded him to stay in the tire tracks of the cars ahead of him as he’d dropped two-tenths back of the cars in front. He was still in the spot on Lap 6, when the spotter told him to slow for a big wreck on the back straightaway.
Running 4th in line on the inside, Brandon Jones’ #20 Swiffer / Menards Toyota was bumped loose by Jesse Love’s #2 Whelen Chevrolet, hooking Jones hard to the right, clipping the left-rear of Carson Kvapil’s #1 Bass Pro Shops / Clarience Tech Chevrolet. As Kvapil spun down the track, Jones immediately blocked the path of Dye, who smashed into the back of the #20. Dye’s car pinballed off the wall and into Jones a second time as the two careened onto the paved runoff area midway down the track. Jones managed to limp down pit road with the other drivers involved, including Connor Zilisch, who suffered nose damage to his #88 WeatherTech Chevrolet and briefly took the last spot on Lap 7. But Dye was stranded on the apron, and he immediately took the last spot from Zilisch that time by. Jones then joined Dye in the garage, taking 37th with the same five laps completed.
superspeedways pic.twitter.com/PvbpjEFnZq
— Daniel Dye (@danieldye43) February 15, 2025
Taking 36th was Kyle Sieg, who suffered a rear end failure on his #28 Toppool.com Ford that sent him behind the wall under the next caution on Lap 21. That yellow came for Brennan Poole, another of the drivers involved in the Lap 6 pileup, suffering right-front damage to the #44 that laps later caused his hood to flap over the windshield entering the tri-oval. Poole still managed to finish 30th, leaving the final two spots in the Bottom Five to Nick Sanchez, whose #48 Big Machine Vodka Spiked Coolers Chevrolet was bump-drafted into the outside wall entering Turn 3 on Lap 60, then Blaine Perkins whose #31 Werner Chevrolet trailed smoke early in Stage 3.
Jesse Love, whose contact triggered Dye’s and Jones’ exit from Saturday’s race, went on to take the victory in an overtime finish cut short by yet another multi-car pileup on the final lap. Among those collected was Leland Honeyman, who in the debut for Cope Family Racing drove his #70 DPR Construction Chevrolet to 6th in Stage 1, was running 13th just before the final restart, then slipped to 21st after the wreck.
New teams and veteran drivers alike impress under Daytona’s lights
Avoiding trouble was Dean Thompson, who with Sam Hunt Racing in the #26 Thompson Pipe Group Toyota finished 8th and 5th in the two stages, then took the checkered flag in 8th. This was Thompson’s first top-ten finish in only his third series start.
Jordan Anderson’s 38th-place car on the grid briefly lost touch with the pack in the final laps, then charged back to finish 7th – his third-straight top-ten finish in a XFINITY race at Daytona.
Patrick Emerling earned his first career top-ten finish in his 52nd start by finishing 10th in the #07 Firman Power Equipment Chevrolet for DGM Racing x JIM. Emerling himself overcame a miscue on pit road where his teammate Garrett Smithley accidentally pulled into his pit stall, and made up a lap in the late stages to put himself back in contention.
And just outside the Top 10 in 11th came Matt DiBenedetto, a strong debut for the reorganized Viking Motorsports. This team had broken away from RSS Racing’s #38 entry, changed manufacturers and car numbers to the #99, and improved from 30th on the starting grid. DiBenedetto earned three top-ten finishes in the XFINITY Series last year, including a career-best 7th he earned art Iowa and matched at Michigan.
LASTCAR STATISTICS
*This marked the first last-place finish for the #10 in a XFINITY Series race at Daytona since July 5, 2019, when A.J. Allmendinger’s #10 Cornerstone Produce Group Chevrolet finished 3rd in a Kaulig Racing 1-2-3 finish, only to fail a post-race vacuum test that led to his disqualification.
THE BOTTOM FIVE
38) #10-Daniel Dye / 5 laps / crash
37) #20-Brandon Jones / 5 laps / crash
36) #28-Kyle Sieg / 22 laps / rear end
35) #48-Nick Sanchez / 59 laps / crash / led 3 laps
34) #31-Blaine Perkins / 79 laps / power steer
2025 LASTCAR XFINITY SERIES OWNER'S CHAMPIONSHIP
1st) Kaulig Racing (1)
2025 LASTCAR XFINITY SERIES MANUFACTURER'S CHAMPIONSHIP
1st) Chevrolet (1)
2025 LASTCAR XFINITY SERIES DRIVER'S CHAMPIONSHIP
