Keselowski had a shot at first Daytona 500 win until Herbst wreck

Brad Keselowski had an opportunity to win the Daytona 500 coming to the finish line, and he would have liked to have seen how it would have finished if he made it there unscathed.

Keselowski, however, wound up with Riley Herbst in his lap.

“The [No.] 35 just wrecked me out of nowhere for no reason,” Keselowski said. “That was one of the dumbest things I’ve ever seen. He had no chance at blocking my run. I had a huge run.

“I don’t know if I could have gotten [Tyler Reddick] and [Ricky Stenhouse Jr.], but I would have liked to have found out because my run was coming fast. The 35 just wrecked us and himself. Pretty stupid.”

In the run to the finish off Turn 4, Hebst came across the track in the tri-oval as he made a move to the right of Chase Elliott. But Herbst wasn’t clear, as Keselowski was still charging too, and the two collided. It triggered the final multi-car wreck of the race, which took out the rest of the top five finishers behind winner Tyler Reddick.

“I thought, well, one lane block kind of makes sense,” Keselowski said. “But to block from the very bottom all the way to the top and wreck yourself and everybody else is just stupid. Very, very stupid.”

Keselowski was credited with a fifth-place finish. Most importantly, he walked away uninjured, or at least not further injured, after racing eight weeks removed from a broken femur.

“I feel really good,” Keselowski said. “The race went really well, I felt really well in the car, and got in a crash at the end and couldn’t even feel it.”

“I’m proud to make it this far,” he said. “A few weeks ago, I wasn’t sure I was going to get to run this race. To get to run the race and have an opportunity to win it, that’s pretty good. I’m just disappointed not to bring it home.”

Sunday was the 17th time Keselowski attempted the Daytona 500.

“I felt good about being in position, for sure,” he said. “At the end, it’s a roll of the dice of who is going to wreck who, who is going to make good moves and bad moves. The dice didn’t fully roll our way.”