Daytona Beach, FL – One of the biggest country bands to ever come out of the greater Daytona Beach area will be coming back home.
Florida Georgia Line has been named as the main act for the 2016 Daytona 500 Pre-Race Show. That will take place just before the start of the 58th annual edition of the Great American Race on February 21st.
“We are thrilled to secure Florida Georgia Line as the performers for the Daytona 500 Pre-Race Show,” said Daytona International Speedway President Joie Chitwood III. “Florida Georgia Line is country music’s premier duo and will provide race fans with an energetic performance.”
Brian Kelley – the Florida half of the duo – is the son of Ormond Beach mayor Ed Kelley and attended both Seabreeze High School and Daytona State College before making it big in the country music world alongside Tyler Hubbard.
“It’s a dream come true to play in the city where I was born, went to high school in and now have the honor of being a part of one of my family’s favorite sporting events,” Kelley said. “Performing at the 500 feels full circle to me as I grew up working the 500 as a fundraiser for our baseball team and was in awe then and still am.”
Florida Georgia Line recently joined another country duo – Brooks & Dunn – in becoming the only artist in history to earn 4 back-to-back #1 singles for multiple weeks on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart. The duo also recently broke the record for longest #1 single on that same chart.
Next year’s Daytona 500 will be the first since the completion of Daytona Rising, the $400 million renovation of the historic motorsports facility.
Seating at DIS has been reduced to just over 100,000 due to the backstretch seats coming down as part of Daytona Rising and because DIS used wider seats along the frontstretch as part of the renovation.
Tyler Hubbard & Brian Kelley (photo courtesy of DIS)
Copyright 2015 Southern Stone Communications.