The Daytona 500 has been contested on Presidents' Day Weekend for eight years in a row going back to 2018, and the "Great American Race" was previously associated with the holiday weekend from 1971 to 2011 as well.
But that could be in jeopardy moving forward, given the NFL's desire to expand to an 18-game regular season schedule. The regular season schedule is currently 17 games long, and the Super Bowl is contested on the second Sunday in February, one week before the Daytona 500 – NASCAR's "Super Bowl".
While an expanded 18-game schedule would also involve a reduction from three preseason games to two, the NFL has no plans to start the regular season a week earlier.
NASCAR, Daytona 500 possibly facing major NFL problem
Instead, they want the regular season to start on the same weekend in September, the playoffs to be pushed back by a week in January, and the Super Bowl to be contested on Presidents' Day weekend.
Prior to the expansion to a 17-game schedule four seasons ago, the Super Bowl had generally been contested two weeks prior to the Daytona 500 (one in 2021, because Presidents' Day was the earliest it could possibly be).
But with the NFL targeting Presidents' Day weekend for the "Big Game", which would give a percentage of its fans a long-awaited holiday Monday afterward, it has put NASCAR in a tough position.
NASCAR has already made a number of concessions due to the NFL's continued schedule expansion. The Clash is now contested two Sundays prior to the Daytona 500 rather than one, and the single-car qualifying session is now contested on the Wednesday prior to the race, rather than one Sunday prior.
But that doesn't mean the NFL won't effectively command more concessions. What the NFL wants, the NFL usually gets.
There are a number of factors for NASCAR to consider if NFL makes the change it wants to make, given the fact that everybody knows football is king in the United States. Super Bowl LIX was recently watched by over 126 million fans, an all-time record.
Is NASCAR willing to push back its 36-race season by a week? The season did used to end later than it does now, so that could be a possibility. But back then, the broadcast partners only included Fox and NBC; now the schedule includes Fox, NBC, Amazon Prime Video, and TNT Sports.
The Daytona 500 is also shown annually on Fox, and Fox is part of the Super Bowl broadcast rotation. After airing this year's game, it is next on the schedule in 2029 and 2033.
Bottom line, the Daytona 500 and the Super Bowl going head-to-head is a nightmare scenario. But given the NFL's influence and power, such a scenario would end up being NASCAR's and only NASCAR's headache to deal with, not the NFL's.