02/16/26 12:50:00
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02/16 12:49 CST From antitrust fight to victory lane: Michael Jordan's 23XI
grabs a Daytona 500 win
From antitrust fight to victory lane: Michael Jordan's 23XI grabs a Daytona 500
win
By JENNA FRYER
AP Auto Racing Writer
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (AP) --- Michael Jordan inherited the racing bug from his
late father, who routinely packed everyone into the car and drove from North
Carolina to a handful of tracks every year as attending NASCAR races became
Jordan family vacations.
Decades later, Jordan is now a Daytona 500 winner.
He was an ecstatic team owner during the victory celebration, which he joined
seconds before winner Tyler Reddick was presented the trophy.
Reddick paused the party and was enveloped in Jordan's arms before the
Basketball Hall of Famer gave high-fives to the No. 45 crew from 23XI Racing. A
stream of well-wishers soon followed, including NASCAR chairman Jim France, who
warmly congratulated Jordan with a smile and a handshake.
It was at least the second cordial public interaction the two have shared since
December, when France and NASCAR settled the federal antitrust lawsuit that
23XI and Front Row Motorsports had lodged. The lawsuit consumed the sport for
more than two years and ended on the ninth day of trial, when NASCAR relented
and settled before the top motorsports series in the United States suffered any
more humiliation.
The settlement was a huge win for Jordan, who forever will be viewed as the
team owner bold enough to stand up to NASCAR's dictatorship way of ruling the
series. But that was already behind Jordan by the time he got to Daytona
International Speedway, where he started Sunday by insisting the goal was to
help grow NASCAR moving forward and focus on making 23XI a
championship-contending race team.
"Both sides have been somewhat at a stalemate and we both needed to have
conversations about change, how we can grow this sport," Jordan told Fox Sports
before the green flag. "Unfortunately, we had to go through what we had to go
through. But I think coming out of that, you have a much better appreciation
for each other and I think it opens up conversations amongst each other to
continue to grow the game."
Hours later, he was in victory lane celebrating as if he'd just won a seventh
NBA championship. When France stopped by, it was clear all parties are moving
forward.
Denny Hamlin, the three-time Daytona 500 winner who is partners with Jordan at
23XI, was the winning team owner representative in post-victory requirements
and said there are no lingering bad feelings among the parties.
"I think December was a wake-up call. I think that the conversations since then
have been a lot of self-reflection, in my opinion, from NASCAR. I think they
would have done things differently had they had the opportunity to," Hamlin
said. "But we knew that we needed to stick up for what we believed was right.
We have to now figure out how we can get the sport back where it was decades
ago.
"In order to do that, the only way we can do it is we're all going to have to
pull the rope in the same direction. Even conversations that I've had with
NASCAR executives as late as a couple days ago, sitting in a bus talking about
what do we need to be five years from now, two years from now, 10 years from
now. What does the sport need to look like?
"Those were all really good conversations, and they were very open to
suggestions."
Jordan didn't become a NASCAR participant until 2021, when he partnered with
Hamlin, a three-time Daytona 500 winner, to form 23XI. He attends races ---
sometimes he watches from pit road, other times a suite --- and although others
run the team, Jordan is involved and sounds committed to NASCAR.
The Reddick win was a win for NASCAR, Hamlin argued, because it got Jordan into
the headlines.
"It's big for the sport. He's the most popular athlete in the world. I don't
think there's any disputing that," Hamlin said. "He loves the sport, and
certainly he goes to a lot of races. Sometimes you don't even see him and he's
there. He makes more races than people know. He loves this race team."
___
AP auto racing: https://apnews.com/hub/auto-racing
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