Who is Ryan Newman, the NASCAR driver in the Daytona 500′s horrifying crash?

Monday’s fiery crash at the end of the Daytona 500 wasn’t the first of Ryan Newman’s almost 20-year NASCAR career, but it was certainly the scariest.

Newman was leading the final lap of Monday’s race — originally slated for Sunday but moved due to inclement weather — when driver Ryan Blaney clipped his No. 6 Ford and sent him crashing into the wall. His car flipped and rolled, then Corey LaJoie, impaired by smoke on the track, rammed into Newman’s driver’s side.

His team, Roush Fenway Racing, later announced that Newman was in “serious condition, but doctors have indicated his injuries are not life-threatening.”

Newman, an Indiana native and father of two daughters who studied engineering at Purdue University, isn’t necessarily among NASCAR’s elite drivers, but he has had a solid career.

Career numbers

The 42-year-old has 18 victories, 115 top-5 finishes and 262 top 10s over his 20-plus years in the Cup Series. He has not won a NASCAR Cup Series championship, but he finished second to Kevin Harvick in 2014. His last Cup win was at Phoenix in April 2017.

Biggest highlight

Newman led eight laps of a total 200 to win the 2008 Daytona 500 with legendary team owner Roger Penske. That victory, in fact, was Team Penske’s first at Daytona.

Speaking out about dangerous tracks

Newman has been a critic of racing at superspeedways Daytona and Talladega, where the high speeds and tight packs can create horrific crashes.

He once said — and was later fined for his remarks — in 2010 that fans shouldn’t even go to races at Talladega; he had flipped repeatedly in a crash at the Alabama track the year prior. Newman was not injured, but he was trapped until crews could turn the car over and cut the top off to extract him.

He continued to speak out about Talladega and NASCAR years later, after another crash on a wet track in 2013.

“They can build safer race cars, they can build safer walls,” Newman said. “But they can’t get their heads out of their a---- far enough to keep them on the race track, and that’s pretty disappointing.”

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