The last time NASCAR Cup Series drivers completed the Chase for the Championship, in 2014, the format was at its strangest. In a more watered-down version of the playoffs that fans have grown sour on, four drivers still competed for the championship in the season’s final race.
Now, in 2026, the Chase is back to its original format, with none of the top 16 drivers ever truly eliminated from championship contention, except for mathematical possibilities.
In case you’ve been under a rock the last few days, the idea of the return to the Chase is a 10-race sprint to the finish, where consistency matters just as much as actually winning the race. Hallelujah, right?
It might not be the full-season Winston-style championship format some fans were hoping for, but it’s markedly better than the playoff format by just about every metric fans said they cared about.
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All of that is amazing, but one question remains unanswered: How will the Chase affect the racing itself? And in this answer, dear reader, lies the best part about returning to the Chase. We have evidence to look back on.
While none of the early Chase formats quite matches the new one, the earliest are among the closest, and were at the tail end of some of NASCAR’s best years in the new century.
The saying “good points day” has been missing from NASCAR vernacular since “win and in” was implemented, and that’s always been a bit sad for me. Now, though, those good points days will be more important than they have been in the last decade. I would wager that, throughout the regular season, teams will work harder to keep their cars on the track to the finish of a race.
This has led to some of the most memorable non-winning finishes in history, some of which loomed larger later on in the Chase. Dale Earnhardt Jr. at Martinsville in 2006 comes to mind, but there are dozens of other examples.
The most interesting piece of legislation, so to speak, now becomes the DVP clock, which forces a team out of a race if it can’t fix the damage to a racecar within the allotted time. If there are still points to be won, teams may argue that NASCAR can’t, in good faith, force them out of a race they wish to still participate in.
However, it could also lead more drivers to wait out the start of the race and charge for a good finish at the end. Jimmie Johnson, the king of the Chase, used this to his advantage, along with Matt Kenseth.
So, could we see another season like Kenseth’s, which led to a rule barring it from happening again? Potentially. However, under the new format, race winners receive 55 points, up from 40, which means that reality is less likely.
This is just one instance of a change not yet considered that a new format can bring, and it is part of what made the playoffs a mess in the first place. Similarly, stages are still around, but offer nothing in terms of rewards as they did for the old system, so they could be on borrowed time as well.
Additionally, having a full 16-driver field gives mid-tier teams or drivers something to shoot for, as making the Chase or any postseason format is tied to exponentially larger bonuses and purse winnings.
While I believe the true sweet spot to be 12 drivers, as 16 is nearly mathematically impossible to make a last-place run for the championship, it might be best to take the wins where fans can get them.
Yet another point of emphasis that has gone under the radar is the ability to celebrate unlikely victories again. For instance, when Harrison Burton won the Coke Zero Sugar 400 at Daytona before heading into the playoffs to lock himself in, fans reveled in the unlikely victory for, oh, maybe half an hour.
Then the conversation turned to the fact that Burton kept a fairly consistent and popular driver out of the playoffs that year with his win. I’ll let you do your own research as to who that was, but needless to say, the fan base wasn’t happy when all was said and done.
Under the new system, unlikely winners will still be rewarded handsomely for their efforts, but not to the same extent as in the previous one, and that’s a reality that I think is best for all parties involved.
The sentiment around the sport appears positive. That has to be a breath of fresh air for NASCAR, which has been on a roller coaster ride ever since the season ended.
What the governing body of the sport has essentially done is take the best parts of the Winston era, the Chase era and the subsequent playoff era, merge them into one format, and add a rotating championship venue at the end as a cherry on top.
Will it work as intended? Only time will tell, but hey, at least we’re not calling it the playoffs. That was always dumb.
Tanner Marlar is a staff writer for Sports Illustrated’s OnSI Network, a contributor for multiple automotive news outlets, an award-winning sports columnist and talk show host, and a PhD. student at a premier college of media and mass communication. Tanner began working with Frontstretch in 2022, covering the O'Reilly Auto Parts Series.
As I and many others have said, keep race stage points, but eliminate scheduled cautions. Until then, only the final third of any race means much.
As for the DVP clock, eliminate it. NASCAR has plenty of officials at every race. If an official deems a car reasonably safe to drive after repairs, and it is able maintain minimum speed, let it run. Who cares if it’s been in the garage for an hour.
The DVP (not the DON Valley Parkway) is just another NA$CAR “rule” that is totally unnecessary. It would have cost Benny his real championship!
Remember, the DVP came about because fans complained that wrecked race cars back on the track were getting in the way of lead laps cars and preventing real racing. This could be an example of “be careful what you wish for, the solution could be worse than the symptoms”
Yeah, I do recall that. Properly mandated and ruled, I don’t see where it would be a problem, but you’re 100% correct that unintended consequences are always a possibility.
I never understood the big deal back then. Sure, once in a blue moon a car would cause multiple cautions due to dropping debris, but it never seemed an epidemic, where damaged cars were frequently impacting the outcome of races. Continuing to require minimum speed would eliminate the majority of those issues.
Could even make the rule state no laps completed after an accident count unless the car reaches minimum speed for a full lap. That would keep anyone from trying to game the system, crawling around to surpass other cars involved in a big wreck, and getting credit for laps before the black flag for minimum speed.
It was always kind of cool to see cars tooling around on the short tracks, missing most of the front bodywork. Had a modified car look. Even cooler on the rare occasions one of those trashed cars was somewhat competitive on speed.
First off, thanks for reading.
Personally, I’ve never been a fan of the DVP clock. If a car is in rough shape but still meets the minimum speed requirement, they have a right to finish the race, IMO. Call me old-fashioned, but I also think lap traffic is a part of “real racing.” Not saying those who disagree don’t have a point, but I find it part of the challenge. Additionally, I do think there should be a greater understanding that lap cars need to allow the leader to keep their line. All that to say, I think the DVP, as it currently sits, should go away under the new format, but NASCAR needs to be careful how it implements a new damaged vehicle policy.
“where consistency matters just as much as actually winning the race. Hallelujah, right?”
Consistency always mattered more than winning. That is why drivers who had the most wins hardly ever won the title. It is too bad the NA$CAR brain trust will never realize that and some fans too. It is now and always was about POINTS at the end of the season.
I don’t see a reason to ‘eliminate’ any drivers. Why not just let all of the slug it out for the title and final placings?
With 16 drivers in The Chase, legitimate contenders are NOT eliminated. I’m willing to state, without doing ANY research, that NO DRIVER outside the top 10 with 10 races to go has EVER won the NASCAR championship (any format). What The Chase will do is bring those top 16 drivers close enough in points for the final ten races to have a shot at winning the championship.
OK, I did look it up –> Blaney came from 12th in the standings to win 2023…
A) Thanks for fact checking yourself, and correcting what was quite a small error. Wish more people felt accountable for what they say, and didn’t feel lessened by correcting their own mistakes. To err is human. Sadly, this is often not the case in the modern world. I tend to trust people who self correct much more than those who are “never wrong”.
B) Wasn’t certain of your opinion on the The Chase…if you are in favor of it, why bring those on the lower end of the top 16 back into contention? It’s not as though they will have done anything to earn this vs. teams which performed at a high level throughout the season.
Since they still have the idiotic “stage racing” and the spec cars that cannot be competitive, the change in the “chase” will not bring me back. I will come back when they they have cars that can actually race, and when they have races that don’t include scheduled yellow flags.
You are already back because you are commenting on this