NASCAR announced Tuesday that its preseason Cup Series exhibition will return to its roots next year with new-look sponsorship, with the Wheatley Vodka Clash set to open the Speedweeks schedule at Daytona International Speedway.
The non-points exhibition will be held Saturday night, Feb. 13, 2027 serving as the kickoff race for a full slate of events on the 2.5-mile Daytona oval. The schedule is set to culminate with the 69th running of the Daytona 500 on Feb. 21, 2027.
RELATED: Past winners of The Clash
The Clash format and eligibility standards will be released at a later date.
The historic venue announced its full NASCAR schedule for the 2027 season Tuesday, including the dates for Speedweeks presented by AdventHealth and the track’s annual summertime event, the Coke Zero Sugar 400. The full schedule:
Daytona 500 race weekend (Speedweeks Presented by AdventHealth):
- Saturday, Feb. 13: Wheatley Vodka Clash
- Wednesday, Feb. 17: NASCAR Cup Series Daytona 500 Qualifying Presented by Busch Light
- Thursday, Feb. 18: NASCAR Cup Series Duel at Daytona
- Friday, Feb. 19: NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race
- Saturday, Feb. 20: NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series and ARCA Menards Series races
- Sunday, Feb. 21: NASCAR Cup Series Daytona 500
Coke Zero Sugar 400 race weekend:
- Friday, Aug. 27: NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series race
- Saturday, Aug. 28: NASCAR Cup Series Coke Zero Sugar 400
The announcement for the Clash’s title sponsorship coincides with a new multiyear partnership with NASCAR, Daytona International Speedway and Wheatley American Vodka, which has been named the Official Vodka of NASCAR®.
The Clash was first introduced in 1979 as a 20-lap, 50-mile sprint, with only the previous season’s fastest qualifiers in the field. NASCAR Hall of Famer Buddy Baker won the first Clash, topping a field of just nine cars.
After a 2021 edition on Daytona’s road-course configuration, the event was held elsewhere for the first time on a temporary oval at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum for a three-year run that began in 2022. The last two Clash events have been held on another quarter-mile track — historic Bowman Gray Stadium in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
Ryan Preece won the 2026 Clash at Bowman Gray, where racing was postponed twice by heavy snowfall and held three days after its originally scheduled date.
The rest of the 2027 NASCAR national-series schedule is also set to be released at a later date.
Ticket information for both Speedweeks and Coke Zero Sugar 400 race weekend is available at daytonainternationalspeedway.com. The track also announced that Bert Kreischer’s “Full Throttle Festival” will return to Daytona Beach on Feb. 20, 2027. Information about the event’s music and comedy lineup will be updated here.