The NASCAR Playoffs Might Still Change Next Year, But Won’t Get Killed
The 2026 NASCAR schedule has been released and includes a full slate of playoffs races for all three series, but it’s not entirely set in stone.
NASCAR executive vice president and chief venue and racing innovation officer Ben Kennedy said the races will happen as they are scheduled, but the playoffs format may still be updated.
“I know the playoff committee has had a number of meetings over the past several months on different formats that we could look at, and they’ve run a handful of simulations on just various formats, collected some fan feedback,” Kennedy said during a press conference after the schedule’s unveiling.
“I know there are conversations as early as a couple days ago on what the future of the playoff format looks like. Nothing to announce today. What I would say, though, is we want to make sure that we take the time to do it right, that we collect as much information as we can, and hopefully whatever this new format is, if there is a new format, it’s something that will last a long time. We want to be thoughtful and diligent about it, make sure we make the right decisions and moves and give both our fans and our competitors something that they can be really proud of going forward.”
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Kennedy hasn’t officially discussed any of the alternative playoff plans, but there has been speculation that the “win and you’re in” rule may be dropped or that the champion will be chosen based on results from several races, rather than the winner-take-all championship used since 2014.
NASCAR’s last two most popular drivers, Chase Elliott and Dale Earnhardt Jr., both recently said they think the playoffs should be updated or go away entirely.
“We’ve had a really good and competitive battle to the regular season (championship) over — correct me if I’m wrong — the last two or three years,” Elliott told The Athletic’s Jordan Bianchi.
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“It’s really been pretty tight all the way down to Daytona. If you just take that as your sample set over the first 26 weeks, it looks pretty solid to me. The system would be just fine if you just had a full season. And if somebody runs away with it, so what? Let’s celebrate the fact that somebody ran away with it, that somebody was just that good. Motorsports does not have to be like everybody else to be successful. And I’ll stand by that til I get done.”
Earnhardt said “I can’t argue with this,” about Elliott’s position, but added that “it’s unlikely there would ever be a full season points championship [again].”