What Are the Highlights of the 2026 ARCA Series Schedules?

With 23 days until the calendar changes, the 2026 ARCA series schedules are out.

The ARCA Menards Series schedule was released the morning of the season finale at Toledo Speedway, the ARCA Menards Series West schedule was released on Dec. 2 and the ARCA Menards Series East one was released a week later, on the Dec. 9.

All three series schedules feature changes from 2025 to 2026. What are the highlights, and what’s one race to look forward to for each series next year?

ARCA National

Chicagoland Speedway and Pocono Raceway both return to the main series schedule. Chicagoland hosted the series most recently in 2019, and 2026 will mark the 20th time for the series at the 1.5-mile track.

ARCA will serve as the opener for the NASCAR national series return there that weekend. Taking place on Friday night, July 3, hopefully the ’26 race matches the excitement level of the U.S.’ 250th birthday.

Chicagoland also replaces Charlotte Motor Speedway, which is no longer on the schedule in its Memorial Day Weekend spot.

When asked the reasoning behind Charlotte’s departure, ARCA Communications Manager Charles Krall said, “No comment,” but added, “Tracks come on and off the schedule. We hope to be back at Charlotte in the future.”

At least ARCA replaced one holiday weekend race with another one. That’s a fair trade.

Welcome back, Pocono. The Tricky Triangle has hosted 70 ARCA races, most recently in 2023. Pocono will host ARCA on Friday afternoon, June 12. The timeslot will be tough for TV ratings, but the series’ history at the 2.5-mile venue is undeniable. There has not been a back-to-back winner there since 2001, when the late Tim Steele swept both races. That trend should continue next year with most-recent winner Jesse Love racing full time in the NASCAR O’Reilly Series.

Dover Motor Speedway is another racetrack now off the schedule. The track hosted the national series twice and the East series 35 times, dating back to when it was known as the NASCAR Busch North Series in 1987.

Dover saw exciting racing, but also some costly repairs. Eleven of the 24 drivers in 2024 ended with DNFs, and seven exited early in ’25. Moreover, from the ARCA office in Temperance, Mich., it is a haul to Dover. As such, the change from Dover to Pocono made sense.

Lastly, Kansas Speedway retakes the season finale from Toledo Speedway. Krall stated that Kansas track officials expressed interest in hosting the season finale again, as the season finale was at Kansas from 2012-21.

Toledo moves to the spring date of May 16 under the lights. Krall noted part of this move was due to possible weather conditions. Near Lake Erie, the season finale at Toledo has been cold some years and was hot this year. A bonus for the series is that the season finale will now be televised on FOX Sports 1, compared to FOX Sports 2 this year.

Race to look forward to: Toledo. Because it is now a combination race with …

ARCA East

An eight-race slate is on tap for East drivers in ’26. The series begins at Hickory Motor Speedway. It will be the first visit for ARCA at the 0.363-mile short track.

According to Krall, it is currently planned to be a 150-lap race with no scheduled breaks, just like the race at Flat Rock Speedway, but that plan is subject to change.
No support series has been announced for that East race at Hickory, as NASCAR national, zMAX CARS Tour and ASA Stars will all be elsewhere or race at Hickory another day.

Nevertheless, the industry response to the announcement has been stellar on social media. With Charlotte only an hour away, expect a stellar car count and an action-packed race.

A week later, the East series goes to Rockingham Speedway, so two North Carolina tracks will open that series’ year.

Toledo as an East race: cool. While the Toledo date as the season finale brought its own storylines, not seeing East regulars at the ’25 season finale was a bummer. Toledo had a solid car count; this combination race should increase the quality of the field.

Dover’s departure has already been discussed, but the other track not returning is 5 Flags Speedway. Fresh off hosting the prestigious Snowball Derby, the half-mile Florida short track could not build enough date equity with ARCA to make another visit worthwhile.

It’s understandably tough building racing schedules, so if it wasn’t working for one involved party, it is a wise move to try something different.

Now the goal for the East regulars should be to go to victory lane in 2026, because they were shut out this year. Maybe they can do it at the race to watch, which is …

Race to look forward to: Hickory. If the race is 150 laps with zero scheduled breaks, that keeps costs down. Only an hour from Charlotte, beginning the East season and with the hype there already, this ought to be a good one.

ARCA West

ARCA West gets an offseason! Its season begins the last day of February, then the field joins the national series a week later for a combination race at Phoenix Raceway.

Next year adds another race to the series, so it’ll have 13, with Shasta Speedway rejoining the schedule.

Yet only four of the 12 races this season had at least 20 drivers. Why add another race to the schedule?

Shasta is in California, and that state will have five of the 13 race dates. Phoenix and Kevin Harvick’s Kern Raceway also host the series twice, so there are nine races accounted for. In short, the series is attempting to keep costs economical so that teams can race more without significantly increasing their budgets.

We’ll see if it works. Regardless, the West competition is healthy with several teams capable of winning.

Phoenix no longer hosts the season finale. It’s not a complicated reason why. NASCAR moved the fall Phoenix race, as it isn’t hosting the NASCAR national series season finales, so ARCA moved that second race to accompany NASCAR.

Krall also informed Frontstretch that a few other racetracks have expressed interest in hosting the West series. Hence why the Kern race date changed its slot on the schedule. Plus, the field will conclude its season close to teams’ homes, so hopefully the car count will be strong and the racing will be spectacular from start to finish. Speaking of Kern, that is the …

Race to look forward to: Kern for the season opener. It put on a clean race to begin the ’25 slate with an exciting finish. Pushed back a month on the calendar, with West drivers needing to prepare to battle the national division drivers, the pressure will be on to perform well to begin their season. Every extra position on the track is a point gained; every extra spot lost is a point lost. Accrue those points at Kern so that an average or poor finish at Phoenix, with the usual large field, doesn’t leave you in a points hole to begin the year.