It was at the famed Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York City in December 2005, an awards dinner honoring that season’s NASCAR Busch, Truck, and regional series champions. Seated almost anonymously at one of the tables was 15-year-old Joey Logano and his parents, who were all guests of NASCAR.
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Logano’s presence wasn’t a total surprise, as having started racing at the age of six, he had gone on to become a teen sensation in his native Northeast.
Just a few months before that ’05 awards dinner, future NASCAR Hall of Famer Mark Martin called Logano ‘the real deal’ and boldly predicted, “I am absolutely, 100-percent positive, without a doubt that he can be one of the greatest that ever raced in NASCAR. I’m positive. There’s no doubt in my mind.”
As he sat at the table, the well-mannered Logano had a wide-eyed look on his face, taking it all in, shyly smiling at times, and listening attentively to all the stories the assembled drivers told. It was almost as if Logano was saying to himself, “Gosh, how did I get here? Will I ever be in their shoes and be a big champion like them?”
Boy, would that change in a hurry. Making his NASCAR Cup debut less than three years later, Logano would go on to become one of NASCAR’s great drivers. Ten years after his NASCAR debut, he would become a Cup Series champion for the first time in 2018.
He’d follow that up with another Cup title in 2022 and completed the hat trick with a third crown last season.
Logano Is Set To Achieve One of NASCAR’s Greatest Milestones
Sunday at Dover Motor Speedway, Logano—still in the prime of his racing career at only 35 years old—will make the 600th start of his Cup career. In so doing, he will become the youngest driver in Cup history to reach that milestone, surpassing the sport’s greatest driver, Richard Petty.
Petty, with the justified nickname of ‘The King,’ made the 600th start of his 1,184-start career in 1973 at the age of 35 years, 7 months, and 23 days.
Fifty two years later, Logano, who came into NASCAR with his colorful nickname of ‘sliced bread’—as in the greatest thing since sliced bread (courtesy of former Busch Series champion Randy LaJoie, father of Corey LaJoie)—has beaten Petty to 600 starts by nearly half a year, doing so in just 35 years, 1 month and 26 days.
It’s not the first time Logano earned ‘youngest’ honors in NASCAR. He was the youngest Xfinity Series race winner at 18 years, 21 days, and then just over a year later, became the youngest NASCAR Cup Series race winner at 19 years, 35 days.
Fast forward to today, even though he’s 11th in the Cup standings heading into Sunday’s race—and considering its unique playoff system that theoretically allows a driver to go from the 16th seed to win the championship 10 weeks later—don’t count Logano out for possibly earning a fourth title this season.
To date, Logano has 37 wins in his Cup career. He’s won at least one race in 14 of his first 16 seasons (and it will be 15 of 17 once this season is over, as he’s already won one race thus far in 2025).
Can Logano Make 198 More Consecutive Starts?
Another key to Logano’s success is his durability. Starting with his first full-time Cup season in 2009 and through Sunday’s race at Dover, Logano will have made 597 consecutive starts.
NASCAR Hall of Famer and four-time Cup champ Jeff Gordon, now the No. 2 in command at Hendrick Motorsports, holds the record as NASCAR’s Iron Man with 797 consecutive starts, having passed the previous Iron Man, Ricky Rudd, who made 788 consecutive starts in his own Hall of Fame career.
If Logano can remain healthy and uninjured, he has a legitimate chance of someday passing Gordon to become the new Iron Man of NASCAR.
While 600 starts (597 consecutive) is a great achievement, if NASCAR continues to have 36-race seasons like it has had for the last 25 years (since 2001), Logano could theoretically pass Gordon’s Iron Man mark in the third race of the 2031 season. And ‘Sliced Bread’ will still be relatively young at 40 years old (he won’t turn 41 until May 24 that year).
Let’s say, hypothetically, that Logano were to race for another 10 seasons and retire at 45 years old. If he can somehow maintain his career average of two-plus wins per season going forward, the Connecticut native potentially stands to retire with close to 60 wins in his definite NASCAR Hall of Fame career.
Logano Has Only Raced For Two Cup Team Owners—Two of the Best
Oh, and one more thing to note: Logano has raced for just two team owners in his Cup career—and two of the greatest owners at that—Joe Gibbs and Roger Penske.
Gibbs didn’t renew Logano’s contract after the 2012 season, partly due to a tenure that resulted in just two Cup wins for Logano with JGR. But since signing with Penske in 2013, Logano has gone on to win 35 Cup races, as well as the afore-mentioned three Cup championships.
Somehow, some way, even though he may never admit it publicly, it would not be surprising if in Gibbs’ most private moments, he smacks himself upside the head and laments, “What were you thinking when you let that Sliced Bread kid go?”
