NASCAR shared the 2022 Cup Series schedule Wednesday (Sept. 15), revealing a few notable changes as Cup drivers compete in the Next Gen cars for the first time.
The first was announced yesterday: the Clash is moving from Daytona International Speedway to the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on Feb. 6, 2022.
NASCAR adds another new track to the Cup calendar for 2022 — World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway. The 1.25-mile racetrack has held Camping World Truck Series events since 1998 (except for 2011-2014). The Xfinity Series also ran at Gateway from 1997-2010. Cup will compete in St. Louis, Mo. on June 5.
After taking Homestead-Miami Speedway out of the playoffs in 2020-21, the 1.5-mile course comes back to the fold on Oct. 23. Phoenix Raceway will still host the championship on Nov. 6.
Las Vegas Motor Speedway and Texas Motor Speedway exchanged their fall dates; Texas is now on Sept. 25, while Las Vegas moves to Oct. 16. Additionally, Kansas Speedway will also be in the playoffs on Sept. 11, running right after Darlington Raceway.
Cup returns to Auto Club Speedway on Feb. 27 after its absence from the 2020 and 2021 schedules due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s the final race run on the 2-mile layout before its reconfiguration to a half-mile track.
ACS comes after the season opener at Daytona International Speedway on Feb. 20 and will air on FOX.
The Bristol Motor Speedway dirt race comes back on Easter Sunday night (April 17). Joey Logano won the inaugural event on the Bristol dirt.
On May 22, Texas will host the All-Star Race for the second year in a row. Earlier this year Kyle Larson took the $1 million prize.
Nashville Superspeedway also returns to the schedule, kicking off NBC’s coverage of the second half of the season. It will run on June 26 after a one-week break in competition.
The Fourth of July weekend will be at Road America again. Cup competes on July 3.
Pocono Raceway loses a date and will run on July 24. Meanwhile, Cup returns to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course for the second straight year; it comes on July 31.
As is the case for the past few years, the regular season finale will be held at Daytona. Ryan Blaney won this year’s August event.
Networks and times will be announced at a later date, as well as the Xfinity and Truck schedules.
2022.
Let's get it. pic.twitter.com/JhRgVdebbW
— NASCAR (@NASCAR) September 15, 2021
Here is the full 2022 Cup schedule:
Feb. 6 — Clash at L.A. Memorial Coliseum
Feb. 17 — Duel at Daytona
Feb. 20 — Daytona International Speedway
Feb. 27 — Auto Club Speedway
March 6 — Las Vegas Motor Speedway
March 13 — Phoenix Raceway
March 20 — Atlanta Motor Speedway
March 27 — Circuit of the Americas
April 3 — Richmond Raceway
April 9 — Martinsville Speedway
April 17 — Bristol Motor Speedway (dirt)
April 24 — Talladega Superspeedway
May 1 — Dover International Speedway
May 8 — Darlington Raceway
May 15 — Kansas Speedway
May 22 — Texas Motor Speedway, All-Star Race
May 29 — Charlotte Motor Speedway
June 5 — World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway
June 12 — Sonoma Raceway
June 26 — Nashville Superspeedway
July 3 — Road America
July 10 — Atlanta Motor Speedway
July 17 — New Hampshire Motor Speedway
July 24 — Pocono Raceway
July 31 — Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course
Aug. 7 — Michigan International Speedway
Aug. 14 — Richmond Raceway
Aug. 21 — Watkins Glen International
Aug. 27 — Daytona International Speedway (regular season finale)
Sept. 4 — Darlington Raceway (Round of 16 begins)
Sept. 11 — Kansas Speedway
Sept. 17 — Bristol Motor Speedway
Sept. 25 — Texas Motor Speedway (Round of 12 starts)
Oct. 2 — Talladega Superspeedway
Oct. 9 — Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL
Oct. 16 — Las Vegas Motor Speedway (Round of 8 begins)
Oct. 23 — Homestead-Miami Speedway
Oct. 30 — Martinsville Speedway
Nov. 6 — Phoenix Raceway (Championship)
About the author
Joy joined Frontstretch in 2019 as a NASCAR DraftKings writer, expanding to news and iRacing coverage in 2020. She's currently an assistant editor while continuing to write daily fantasy and news articles. A California native, Joy was raised as a motorsports fan and started watching NASCAR extensively in 2001. She earned her B.A. degree in Liberal Studies at California State University Bakersfield in 2010.
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Bristol on Easter? That is a bold gamble and questionable choice given the conservative lean of the fandom.
Otherwise not too radical besides the fact that there is only one off weekend, a very aggressive schedule.
Race I am looking most forward to is the Cali race on the reconfigured half-mile track.
Most perplexing is why they group the short tracks together instead of spreading them around a bit better.
Glad to see the Daytona road course race gone. I thought there were too many road courses on the schedule anyway, 5 is just about right.
With Auto Club, Las Vegas and Phoenix on consecutive Sundays will the teams be staying on the West Coast?
The way the last ten events shape up it seems the scheduled makers must think Johnson is being gifted another title. Or another Hendrick car.
I think Ben Kennedy may be the new Nascar “brain trust,”. He never was the brightest.
Another year with no new short tracks. Almost every fan says add more short tracks but for some reason Nascar doesn’t listen.
The Clash in LA is a terrible idea! After living down there for the first third of my life, I have a few points. Most tracks are outside of the main metropolis they are associated with. The Colosium is in the heart of LA. Traffic is atrocious daily. Parking is terrible. If you fly in, where are you going to stay for less than $250 a night, within 50 miles? Strict Covid rules. Besides, how did Cali earn another race? Cali fans ( my friends included) have always been lukewarm. Something or someone must have opened up their purse strings for this boondoggle.
I don’t think the traffic and parking will be an issue, nor lodging. The only people that will go to that race will be people that already have a reason to be out there (other than the race) or live within a reasonable drive. It’s a glorified practice session. People weren’t flying to Daytona to see the Clash, they were coming to see The 500. If they could swing a few more days off and afford a few more bucks why not make a week of it and see everything.
I guess I understand now. I thought the business model was getting the optimum venue with the optimum performance to provide the optimum entertainment to attract the maximum audience in the stands without too much monetary burden to provide the most money for said business. Just TV and sponsor money is all you need now adays.
You have to wonder what the ulterior motive is. Brian moved the Southern 500 to Fontana because he thought it would help bring an NFL team to L.A.
If you were a team owner, would you send your team to to the west coast for 75 lap exhibition race? I sure wouldn’t. NASCAR should just trash the Clash.
I feel that way too but I’ve been thinking…..
If their choice is an exhibition restrictor plate race at Daytona, or short track in Los Angeles, it might be cheaper to go to the west coast. What do you think costs more, taking the whole team on trip to California or taking a car (multiple cars for some teams) to the junk yard when it is destroyed in one of THE BIG ONES?
When was the last time NA$CAR had an event on a 1/4 mile track?
Where are the pits? Where will the cars get on the track? At the CNE the pits were under the rear grandstand and the cars entered section on the backstretch. The only place to enter the “race track” seems to be from the end zones of the football field.
Cup cars on a tiny track inside a football stadium borders on the insane. Carnage will abound (even the pundits on NASCAR Now have stated this during reporting this week). Why should owners send brand-new equipment to an admitted wreck-fest? Can any team other than the big three really afford to trash their new equipment? Bad, bad idea.
“Cup returns to Auto Club Speedway on Feb. 27 after its absence from the 2020 and 2021 schedules due to the COVID-19 pandemic.”
The was a 2020 race, it just happened just before COVID came, with Alex Bowman winning.