Sieg Breaks Through at Daytona in 424th O'Reilly Start

Ryan Sieg had been close enough to know exactly what a NASCAR O'Reilly Auto Parts Series victory looked like from second place. Five runner-up finishes and more than 13 seasons of trying had given him every view except the one from the center of Victory Lane.

That changed Friday night at Daytona.

Sieg converted a late two-tire stop into fourth place for the overtime restart, cleared a pair of JR Motorsports cars when the green flag returned, and held off Austin Hill by 0.149 seconds to win the Winn-Dixie 250. He led two laps. They were the final two laps of his 424th series start.

The number matters because Sieg's career has never been separated from the work required to keep RSS Racing on the grid. This was an owner-driver breakthrough for one of the few family-run teams still racing full time against the largest organizations in the series. Sieg did not borrow the stage from a Cup star or inherit a rain-shortened result. He took the lead in overtime at Daytona and beat the series' best superspeedway driver to the checkered flag.

Carson Kvapil and Hill controlled most of the race. Kvapil led 50 of 105 laps and spent the night trying to become the first driver to earn his first three series victories consecutively. Hill won Stage 1, led 22 laps, and again looked capable of deciding a Daytona race whenever he chose a lane.

Sieg's race was quieter. The No. 38 started 12th, stayed attached to the lead draft, and waited for crew chief Kevin Starland to create track position. The late two-tire call moved Sieg into the top five when the field needed one more restart.

Track position alone did not win it. Sieg restarted fourth behind the JR Motorsports cars of Kvapil and Justin Allgaier. He launched through the opening created ahead of him, cleared the front row, and then had Hill filling the mirror for the final circuit. The No. 21 had the reputation and the push. The No. 38 had the lane Sieg had waited 424 starts to protect.

He crossed the line 0.149 seconds ahead. Kvapil finished third, Anthony Alfredo fourth, and Brandon Jones fifth. Sieg became the fifth first-time winner of the 2026 season and set the series record for the most starts before a first victory.

RSS Racing has spent years doing more with less. Sieg made his first series start in 2013 and built a career around consistency, mechanical survival, and the ability to turn mid-pack resources into Chase-level results. The team had won before with another driver in a specially prepared car, but this was the victory tied directly to the family operation and its full-time centerpiece.

That is why the celebration carried more weight than a normal Daytona upset. The crew members around Sieg had absorbed the runner-up finishes, the races lost by inches, and the seasons when simply returning the same cars to the track was an achievement. The overtime call gave them a chance. Sieg finished the job himself.

The win did not move him into The Chase because he was not eligible on points, but it changed the way his career will be described. Sieg is no longer the dependable veteran still searching for one. He is a NASCAR winner, and he earned the title by beating Hill straight up at Daytona.

While Sieg raced for a first trophy, the regular-season finale was eliminating contenders behind him. William Sawalich and Brent Crews entered one point above teammate Taylor Gray at the cutline. Neither survived the night cleanly.

Crews was caught in a Turn 3 crash on Lap 27 after Patrick Staropoli triggered the incident. The No. 19 went to the garage. Nineteen laps later, contact between Corey Day and Alfredo sent Day across the track and into Sammy Smith and Sawalich. The second Joe Gibbs Racing bubble car was finished as a title threat.

Gray needed only to bring home a damaged points result. His 26th-place finish was enough to claim a Chase position after the two teammates ahead of him fell out.

Rajah Caruth took the more dramatic route. He won Stage 2 and was running second with three laps remaining when a push from Allgaier turned the No. 88 down the backstretch. The crash created the overtime that Sieg won. Caruth finished 32nd, but the 18 stage points he had banked earlier in the night carried him into The Chase.

Parker Retzlaff, Sam Mayer, Gray, and Caruth secured the final four postseason positions. Sawalich and Crews were left outside after entering the race above the line.

Sieg won the race, but Kvapil owned the highest fantasy score. His 50 laps led, second-place finish in Stage 1, third-place finish in Stage 2, and third-place race result produced 62 base FantasyJolt points. That was enough to make him the 2.0x Group A driver in the perfect lineup.

Alfredo was the slate-changing value. He cost $9, finished fourth, collected points in both stages, and scored 55.2 base points. Hill's Stage 1 win, 22 laps led, and runner-up finish returned 53.2 points at $15. Those three drivers consumed $38 of the cap and supplied the first three multiplier groups.

Brennan Poole and Garrett Smithley completed the optimal build through place differential. Poole drove from 33rd to seventh for 35 points at $7. Smithley advanced from 27th to 12th for 29 points at $5. Together they made it possible to use both Hill and Kvapil without breaking the $50 cap.

Sieg scored 45.2 points and ranked fifth on the slate despite winning. That is not a scoring flaw. Kvapil, Alfredo, and Hill accumulated stage and laps-led production that Sieg did not have, while Allgaier's 12-position gain gave him 47 points in sixth. Sieg's value was concentrated in the trophy.

The perfect lineup used the full $50 salary cap and scored 373.15 points.

The saved FantasyJolt projection made Kvapil the top play, and that was the best call on the slate. He did not complete the three-race winning streak, but the model correctly identified the driver most likely to combine finishing position, stage production, and laps led.

The misses were concentrated in the crash-damaged bubble contenders. Crews was projected P5 before the race and finished 35th after the Lap 27 incident. Sawalich, Sammy Smith, Dean Thompson, Corey Day, Jesse Love, and Caesar Bacarella also returned less than their pre-race positions suggested.

Alfredo, Poole, and Smithley created the separation. Alfredo moved from P21 in the saved order to second in actual FantasyJolt scoring. Poole gained 26 positions on the track. Smithley turned a $5 salary into the last piece of the perfect lineup.

The saved projection lineup of Kvapil, Allgaier, Crews, Blaine Perkins, and Bacarella scored 260.25 points after multipliers, capturing 69.74% of the perfect score. At Daytona, getting the anchor right was not enough when two of the required value plays came from outside the model's leading group.

• 424 starts: Sieg's wait for his first series victory, a division record.
• Two laps led: The only laps Sieg needed.
• 0.149 seconds: The margin over Hill.
• 50 laps led: Kvapil's race-high total.
• 21 lead changes: Shared among 11 drivers.
• Four cautions: Covering 25 laps.
• 46.913 seconds: Mayer's fastest green-flag lap on Lap 42.
• 62 points: Kvapil's slate-leading FantasyJolt base score.
• 373.15 points: The perfect-lineup total.

The O'Reilly Series opens its nine-race Chase at Darlington with Allgaier as the top seed and Kvapil carrying the momentum of two wins and a Daytona podium. Gray and Caruth arrive only because they found different ways to survive a cutline race that eliminated the two drivers who began above them.

Sieg will arrive without a Chase position, but no longer without a win. Daytona did not erase the 423 starts that came before Friday night. It made every one of them part of the story.