Thousands of race fans will converge in Daytona for the big race on Sunday. This is the first Daytona 500 in the newly revamped speedway.
Construction crews spent nearly three years stripping the speedway down to the beams and rebuilt it with new seats, escalators, elevators and luxury suites.
By demand, all 101,000 seats in the grandstand are wider. Speedway President Joie Chitwood said everything is new, except the track.
“That race track has not changed its location, yes we’ve repaved it once or twice, but that start-finish line, that banking is the same Lee Petty crossed in 1959 for the very first race,” said Chitwood
The $400 million renovation is the first major upgrade to the Daytona Speedway since it opened in 1959.
Grandstand tickets for Sunday’s race are sold out.
Click on the photos to see a slideshow of the new speedway.