A Terrifying Crash And A Stunning Finish Cap Off Wild Coke Zero 500 At Daytona

Every NASCAR fan knows what can happen in the final laps of any race at Daytona International Speedway, and Saturday night's Coke Zero Sugar 400 was no different. Stewart-Haas Racing's Josh Berry was involved in a terrifying crash that set up a wild finish to a wild race.

Despite a clean Stage 1, there were multiple big crashes and even a bizarre incident that left Daniel Suarez's No. 99 car on fire, but it was Berry's crash in the closing laps that people are going to remember most.

With two laps to go Berry was battling Team Penske's Austin Cindirc for the lead down the backstretch. However — as can often happen in situations like this — Berry seemed to get a bad push that turned his car and sent him cutting across the track in front of Cindric.

In doing so the car flipped and skidded toward the wall before slamming into head-on — while still upside down, mind you — which left his No. 4 Ford Mustang Dark Horse spinning on its lid like a top.

That's terrifying. Cup Series cars are pretty sage these days but they're not meant to take impacts like that, not even into SAFER barriers.

Fortunately, crews were able to extract Berry from the car, and he appeared to be no worse for wear after that harrowing ordeal.

Harrison Burton Pulls Off Stunning Victory

There was still a race to finish, and the red flag from the Berry incident sent us to overtime, and that gave us a wild finish that saw Harrison Burton in the No. 21 win his first Cup Series race and punch his ticket to the playoffs.

How about that massive push from Parker Retzlaff in the No. 62 to put Burton in front?

And that battle with Kyle Busch to the line? Ridiculous.

That was Wood Brothers Racing's 100th win and it also made Burton a race-winner like his old man Jeff Burton (who was in the broadcast booth for NBC calling the race) and his uncle, Ward Burton.

There was some controversy about whether Burton blocked Busch after dipping below the double yellow line. There's no doubt that he did, but it was ruled that contact with Busch sent him across it.

Burton doesn't have a ride for next season — ironically, Josh Berry will be in the No. 21 next season — but that should help keep him on teams' radars moving forward.

Whew, what a wild night.

But isn't that kind of what we expect out of Daytona?