In the closing laps of the Daytona 500 on Sunday, Joey Logano looked to fellow Ford driver Michael McDowell for help in his push for victory.

McDowell, however, elected to work with Toyota driver Kyle Busch, drawing the ire of Logano, who finished one spot ahead of him in fourth.

“I was just surprised by the situation and what happened,” Logano said. “I thought that was going to be the plan [working together]. At that point he wasn’t going to win. He’d have to pass Kyle.

“He’s racing, too, I guess and we can’t win these things alone. We’ve proven that quite often but we did what we could do.”

McDowell said he believed driving behind Busch gave him the best chance to win the race, before adding that fellow Ford drivers hadn't helped him out over the weekend.

"The No. 18 [Busch] had a big run, a lot of momentum and Joey had a lot of damage,” he said. “Joey wasn’t going to win the race. I wanted to put myself in the best spot to win the race and the Fords weren’t that friendly to me this weekend.”

McDowell and Logano both drive Fords, but McDowell is a team member of Front Row Motorsports, while Logano drives for Team Penske. McDowell, a veteran of 286 Cup Series races in his career, said he told Logano where his allegiances lie.

“I just told him that my team doesn’t pay me to push Joey Logano to a win. That’s not what I get paid to do," McDowell said.

“At 200 miles per hour, I made a split-second decision on what was the fastest car and who had the best shot of winning the race and that’s where I went.”

Denny Hamlin won Sunday's race, followed by Busch, Erik Jones and then Logano and McDowell.