With practice and qualifying for Saturday’s NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway canceled because of inclement weather, the starting lineup for the Blue Cross NC 300 was determined by NASCAR’s metric.
Carson Kvapil will start first, with Corey Day joining him on the front row. Jesse Love, Brent Crews and Sam Mayer round out the top five.
Saturday’s Blue Cross NC 300 was moved to Sunday at 8 p.m. ET (The CW, ESPN Unlimited, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
CONCORD, N.C. — The pressure of a 40-point swing weighed heavily under the lights in Friday evening’s NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Chase race at Charlotte Motor Speedway, presented by Mobil 1.
Points leader Kaden Honeycutt sought to hold a sizable advantage over No. 1 seed Layne Riggs as the two swapped the lead throughout the 134-lapper at the 1.5-mile oval, but with six laps to go, Honeycutt’s No. 11 Tricon Garage Toyota slid into the wall in Turns 3 and 4, allowing Riggs to storm to the lead and take the victory — his first in The Chase.
Riggs cut the points lead to 17, which would’ve been over 50 points had Honeycutt won instead.
Charlotte marked a swing-and-a-miss for Honeycutt, who finished third. He took all the blame for losing the race late.
“Too much mirror driving on my end,” Honeycutt said. “Seeing the replay, I thought he was closer than that to me. I thought he was actually taking the air off my spoiler, but he definitely wasn’t. I just was in between both lanes. I didn’t do the best job of that.”
Honeycutt and Riggs split the first two stages. Riggs took the opening frame before the sun went fully down, but as the gray skies gave way to darkness, Honeycutt’s No. 11 took over. Honeycutt led a race-high 85 laps and took the Stage 2 win with eyes set on a second consecutive checkered flag to balloon his championship lead.
However, a pair of cautions in the final 20 laps hampered Honeycutt’s advantage over Riggs. A multitruck wreck with 15 laps to go brought the field to a halt for 13 minutes.
Honeycutt fired off well on the final restart with 11 to go, but Riggs stayed in the tire tracks of the No. 11, inching closer and closer to Honeycutt. That ultimately caused Honeycutt to make the race-losing mistake that took him out of contention and let Christian Eckes by to take second.
“ThefirstlapIwasfine,” Honeycutt said of the final restart. “ThesecondlapIwascreepingalittletight andIdon’tknowifthatheatcyclehelpedhimanditmademealittlebitworse.ButIdon’tknow.IthinkIjustpanickedtoomuchwhenhewaswithinatruckortwoandhewascatchingthedraft. I probably should have faked top and then went to the bottom and run my own line, or I should have just committed to the top. I was too much in between, too much in my head on what I was supposed to be doing. So yeah, just definitely a shame. It’s all me on that for sure.”
Still, Honeycutt maintained his points lead, and has placed better than Riggs in two of the first three races to open The Chase.
But the Texas native was adamant that even a third-place finish was not strong enough for his standards – especially if he wants to lift the championship trophy.
“As far as my perspective, I think if you do anything less than try to win, you know, settle for third, fourth, and fifth throughout the day, that’s not what we try to come here to do,” Honeycutt said. “I feel like if we go out and win races and build that 15-point gap and have good stages, he saw what it did at Kansas. I think me and him agreed on it to a certain point. When I got in the fence and I realized I was getting free, I wanted to make sure I hit the right-rear tail and not the right front, and had a right front go down. That would have been significantly worse.
“We’ve raced really hard in late-model stuff, and it’s no different in this. He knows and I know, if we both get out front, we’re probably checking out, and it happened.”
But despite departing Charlotte still the points leader, Honeycutt believes he doesn’t have any sort of advantage. He’s been on both sides — being chased and being the chaser — for the series advantage. Anything that happens, he says, is of his own doing — and nobody else’s.
“Ipicturemyself10thinpointsandfightforeverypointIcangetinstages, then,justgoafterthewin,” Honeycutt said. “Ithinkifyoudoanythingelseotherthanthat,youdon’tmaximizeyourdayfully.Iwillabsolutelyneverbehunted. I will hunt everybody — 35 race trucks on this race track every single week. I felt like at the end, he (Riggs) wasn’t hunting me down. I just made a mistake and screwed up, and just wasn’t in my own mental headspace where I needed to be at. Definitely full blame on me for that. Nothing else.”
CONCORD, N.C. — In the opening laps of Friday’s Ecosave 200, as he was slicing his way forward from the 13th starting position, Layne Riggs declared on his team radio, “They’re in trouble” — they meaning the competition.
Riggs’ seventh victory of the season wasn’t quite as easy as that assessment might have implied. In fact, the driver of the No. 34 Front Row Motorsports Ford had to pass Chase leader Kaden Honeycutt on Lap 128 of 134 to secure his second NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series victory of the season at Charlotte Motor Speedway and the 12th win of his career.
The victory had enormous implications for the series championship. In taking the checkered flag, Riggs narrowed his Chase deficit to 17 points behind Honeycutt, who finished third after losing the runner-up spot to Christian Eckes one lap after Riggs made the winning pass.
“That was a hell of a battle there at the end with me and the 11 (Honeycutt),” said Riggs, who got past Honeycutt when the No. 11 Toyota broke loose in the top lane and tagged the outside wall with the right rear. “That was a lot of fun.
“I think I had to pass the 11 three or four times (after losing spots in the pits). We’ve got to still work on pit road. That was our weakness still, but I kept driving to the front.”
For Riggs, the victory was redemption for the second Chase race Sept. 26 at Kansas, where Riggs hit the outside wall while running second late in the race and finished 19th.
“At Kansas, I was up there, and internally I pressured myself that I needed to go win. Today, I didn’t have any pressure. I just went out and wheeled it.”
Honeycutt repeatedly beat Riggs off pit road but couldn’t hold off the No. 34 Ford on the race track.
“I don’t know how the heck I saved that,” Honeycutt said of his near-spin near the wall while trying to defend the lead with seven laps left. “Just seeing the replay, I wish I hadn’t been air-blocking him as much as I did. It just took away what I was trying to do.
“I just focused on him too much. I should have run my own race.”
Riggs and Honeycutt split the first two stages, with Riggs winning his 12th of the season in Stage 1 and finishing second to Honeycutt in Stage 2.
Eckes finished second for the second straight race but remains fourth in the standings, 88 points behind Honeycutt with four Chase races left. Chandler Smith came home fifth behind non-Chase driver Bayley Currey and trails Honeycutt by 77 points.
“Our Chevrolet was really solid all day,” Eckes said. “We just kind of slow down the straightaway and struggled with a couple balance items. It’s still good to finish second in back-to-back weeks.
“Obviously, we want to win, and I feel like we’re right on the cusp of doing that.”
The race featured five cautions for 28 laps and one 12-minute, 58-second red-flag period for an eight-truck accident on Lap 118. That wreck took out two of the five Kyle Busch tribute cars entered in the race, which preceded a celebration of the life of the late NASCAR Cup Series champion. Both the No. 7 of pole winner Connor Mosack (honoring the 100th Truck Series victory of Kyle Busch Motorsports) and the No. 77 of Rajah Caruth (commemorating KBM’s first win) exited the race at that point.
Daniel Hemric, Landen Lewis, Andrés Pérez, Tyler Ankrum and Justin Haley completed the top 10.
See where your favorite NASCAR Cup Series, NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series and NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series drivers will pit this weekend in a Chase tripleheader at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
NASCAR Cup Series
NASCAR Cup Series Bank of America 400 at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Sunday (3 p.m. ET, USA Network, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series Blue Cross NC 300 at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Sunday (8 p.m. ET, The CW, ESPN Unlimited, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Ecosave 200 at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Friday (5 p.m. ET, FOX, FOX One, NASCAR Racing Network and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Due to continued inclement weather forecasted for the Thompson area later in the weekend, NASCAR and Thompson Speedway Motorsports Park officials have rescheduled the World Series 150 presented by FloSports.com to Saturday, Oct. 10 at 8 p.m. ET.
A full, updated event schedule will be shared at a later time.
The 161st NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour event at Thompson was originally scheduled for Sunday, Oct. 11 at 4:30 p.m. ET.
For the first time since 2020, the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour will crown its champion at Thompson Speedway Motorsports Park, as the Connecticut oval hosts the season finale for a record 29th time. Saturday’s World Series 150 marks the third and final Tour visit to Thompson this season, following victories by Stephen Kopcik on April 12 and Matt Hirschman on Aug. 5.
Patrick Emerling enters the season finale with a 30-point lead over Austin Beers and needs only to take the green flag to secure his first NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour championship. Emerling has dominated the 2026 campaign, leading the series in wins (five), average finish (5.8), top-five finishes (10), top-10 finishes (13) and laps led (659).
Saturday’s World Series 150 also serves as the finale of the FloRacing Connecticut Challenge, a four-race miniseries encompassing the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour’s four Connecticut events. The miniseries champion will earn a $7,500 bonus, with Hirschman holding a nine-point advantage over Kopcik entering the season finale.
NASCAR competition officials announced revisions to Saturday’s schedule at Charlotte Motor Speedway because of the threat of inclement weather related to Hurricane Isaias.
Practice and qualifying for both the NASCAR Cup Series and O’Reilly Auto Parts Series will be moved two hours earlier Saturday. The O’Reilly Series is set for practice at 8:30 a.m. ET and qualifying to follow at 9:35 a.m. ET, both broadcast on ESPN Unlimited. Cup Series practice is now scheduled for 11 a.m. ET with Busch Light Pole Qualifying at 12:05 p.m. ET, with coverage on truTV, PRN Radio and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
The announcement came Friday morning as Isaias moved closer to landfall near Florida’s Gulf Coast. The storm is expected to bring heavy rain to the southeastern U.S.
Race start times currently remain unchanged for a tripleheader weekend for NASCAR’s national series.
The Craftsman Truck Series’ Ecosave 200 is set for a Friday start at 5 p.m. ET (FOX, FOX One, NASCAR Racing Network). The O’Reilly Auto Parts Series resumes its Chase postseason with the Blue Cross NC 300 on Saturday (4 p.m. ET, The CW, ESPN Unlimited, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). The Cup Series hosts the Bank of America 400, the sixth of 10 races in The Chase presented by Mobil 1, with a Sunday main event (3 p.m. ET, USA Network, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Haas Factory Team announced Friday that Cole Custer will return for a third straight season as driver of the No. 41 entry in the NASCAR Cup Series next year.
The news came as NASCAR’s top circuit prepares for Sunday’s Bank of America 400 (3 p.m. ET, USA Network, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) at Charlotte Motor Speedway. It also answers one of the few remaining questions surrounding the Cup Series’ “Silly Season” driver movement for 2027.
Custer has long been connected to team owner Gene Haas, first through Haas’ partnership with Tony Stewart under the Stewart-Haas Racing banner and later with Haas Factory Team, which rebranded after Stewart’s ownership departure ahead of the 2025 season. That reorganization established HFT as a single-car effort in the Cup Series, and Custer has been its driver ever since.
“We are excited to have Cole Custer back in the 41 Haas Factory Team Chevrolet for 2027,” Haas said. “Cole is a championship-caliber driver who brings the consistency we need on a weekly basis and we are proud to continue to support him in the NASCAR Cup Series.”
Custer finished 32nd in the Cup Series standings last year, and that also represents his current ranking with five races left in the 2026 campaign. The 28-year-old California native has one top-10 finish this year, a 10th-place result in the regular-season finale at Daytona International Speedway in August.
Custer is a 15-time winner in the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series, capturing the 2023 championship for Stewart-Haas and finishing as the circuit’s runner-up three times. He also earned a Cup Series triumph at Kentucky Speedway in 2020, converting a bold four-wide pass on the final lap into a victory that helped him seal Rookie of the Year honors.
Haas Factory Team switched manufacturers from Ford to Chevrolet this season. The organization also fields a two-car effort in the O’Reilly Series, with points leader Sheldon Creed and Sam Mayer as teammates.
While plenty remains unknown at Charlotte Motor Speedway this weekend, one thing appears familiar: Toyota’s strength on intermediate tracks. NASCAR’s home track hasn’t hosted a fall race on the oval in nearly a decade, but Toyota dominated before rain shortened May’s Coca-Cola 600 and flexed its muscle again last weekend at Las Vegas. Kyle Larson’s postseason surge, however, could pose the biggest threat yet to the manufacturer’s recent reign.
Returning to Fastlane this year is my weekly NASCAR 36 for 36 pick, where you can come play along. It’s a season-long points battle introduced in 2024 where strategy is the primary emphasis. With 36 chartered cars and 36 races on the 2026 schedule, players can choose each car once for the duration of the season.
MUST START
Driver:Chase Briscoe, Joe Gibbs Racing, No. 19 Toyota Selections remaining: 2 Comment: There might not be a better driver than Briscoe currently in the Cup Series at intermediate tracks. The No. 19 team has won two of the last three races at 1.5-mile venues, including a dominant performance in Sin City. He was out front late the week before at Kansas Speedway before smacking the wall multiple times.
Driver:Denny Hamlin, Joe Gibbs Racing, No. 11 Toyota Selections remaining: 2 Comment: With a scorching start to the 2026 season, Hamlin shouldn’t be reprimanded for how The Chase presented by Mobil 1 has begun for the No. 11 team. Before a Lap 77 spin at Las Vegas, he had a streak of eight straight races at 1.5-mile tracks with finishes of fourth or better. That included a third-place effort in May at Charlotte after leading 75 circuits.
Driver: Tyler Reddick, 23XI Racing, No. 45 Toyota Selections remaining: 2 Comment: Reddick recovered from an early alternator issue at Las Vegas to finish third, reminding everyone how solid the No. 45 team is at intermediates. Charlotte fits Reddick’s wheelhouse, as he led a race-high 119 laps in May. In eight starts at the Charlotte oval, he has an average finish of 9.5, which trails only Hall of Famer Rex White among drivers who have made multiple starts in NASCAR’s backyard.
Chris Graythen | Getty Images
DRIVERS TO AVOID
Driver: Joey Logano, Team Penske, No. 22 Ford Selections remaining: 4 Comment: Penske has made strides at intermediates, scoring two top fives in the last two races. Logano, however, hasn’t joined the party, with his last 1.5-mile top five coming in his 2025 Texas win. He finished eighth in May at Charlotte, but he didn’t finish better than 14th in his previous five visits.
Driver: Daniel Suárez, Spire Motorsports, No. 7 Chevrolet Selections remaining: 5 Comment: Suárez’s crew chief Ryan Sparks threw a Hail Mary attempt in May to win the crown-jewel race. Suárez fended off a Toyota brigade and was assisted by multiple cautions before Mother Nature prematurely ended the race. The victory is Suárez’s only finish better than 15th in the last 10 Charlotte races.
Sean Gardner | Getty Images
SLEEPERS OF THE WEEK
Driver:Austin Cindric, Team Penske, No. 2 Ford Selections remaining: 4 Comment: History would tell you to stay far away from Cindric at Charlotte. In five starts, he has an average finish of 30.8, his worst among all Cup tracks. However, the fifth-year driver is amid consecutive top fives for the first time in his career, both coming at 1.5-mile venues.
Driver:Shane van Gisbergen, Trackhouse Racing, No. 97 Chevrolet Selections remaining: 5 Comment: The road-course ace has led Trackhouse at intermediate tracks in 2026, scoring his best 1.5-mile finish at Las Vegas in ninth. In May, SVG had an average running position of 7.8 and spent 328 of 373 laps planted inside the top 10.
Chris Graythen | Getty Images
FEATURED MATCHUPS
Ryan Blaney vs. Joey Logano
Pick: Blaney Comment: With a 20.1 average finish in 16 starts, Charlotte is Blaney’s worst track on the schedule, statistically. The outlier is a dominant performance in the 2023 Coca-Cola 600, leading 163 circuits. Logano is good, not great in NASCAR’s hub, but given recent performances at 1.5-mile tracks, Blaney gets the edge.
Kyle Larson vs. Tyler Reddick
Pick: Reddick Comment: Reddick has defined consistency at Charlotte, while Larson has top 10s in less than 50% of his starts. With just one start remaining with the No. 5 team the rest of the way, I’m staying clear of Larson this weekend.
Bubba Wallace vs. Carson Hocevar
Pick: Wallace Comment: Neither driver has finished races off in the Queen City. Hocevar was in contention to win the 2025 Coca-Cola 600 until his engine expired. Wallace has been plenty fast at the quad-oval, with Toyota being the overwhelming favorite entering the weekend. Give me Wallace, even though his 23.0 average finish at Charlotte is his worst among 1.5-mile tracks.
Christopher Bell vs. Denny Hamlin
Pick: Hamlin Comment: It’s rare to see Hamlin make a mistake, but his Vegas spin proved costly. Meanwhile, Bell had his own mechanical gremlins, losing power steering. Both JGR drivers need an upswing in performance at Charlotte. While Bell has been ultra-consistent at CMS, Hamlin has five finishes of seventh or better in the last seven Charlotte races, banking 22 top 10s in 35 starts.
MY LINEUP
Starting five: Chase Briscoe, Denny Hamlin, Tyler Reddick, Christopher Bell, Austin Cindric. Garage: William Byron.
36 FOR 36
Pick: Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Hyak Motorsports, No. 47 Chevrolet Comment: With only five races remaining in the 2026 season, it’s time to get creative with these picks. Ever since Stenhouse made his Cup debut at Charlotte with Wood Brothers Racing in 2011, he’s had a knack for the track. Dating back to 2017, the two-time NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series champion has 10 top-15 finishes in 12 Charlotte starts, including finishes of 11th and 12th in two attempts with the rebranded Hyak.
Where the 2026 NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series Chase is concerned, Justin Allgaier has been the poster boy for Murphy’s Law.
After suffering calamities in the first four postseason races, the driver of the No. 7 JR Motorsports Chevrolet is looking for a reversal of fortune in Sunday’s Blue Cross NC 300 at Charlotte Motor Speedway (8 p.m. ET, The CW, ESPN Unlimited, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
“Charlotte has been a really strong track for us over the last few years, but all of those races were in the heat of May, so it will be interesting to see how this weekend plays out,” said Allgaier, who has fallen from first to fourth in the standings since The Chase began at Darlington Raceway.
“I know that everyone on this team is ready to get there. Our Chase hasn’t started quite like we hoped, but this group is ready to go out there and do what we’ve done all year. There is still a lot of racing left to be done, and I feel like Charlotte is a great place to get that momentum back on our side.”
Allgaier, who trails Chase leader Sheldon Creed by 30 points with five races left, is the only former Charlotte oval winner in the field for Saturday’s race. The last 14 races on the 1.5-mile track have produced 14 different winners.
Both second-place Carson Kvapil (19 points behind Creed) and third-place Jesse Love (21 points behind) gained ground at Allgaier’s expense in last Saturday’s race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
Love, the defending series champion, finished third behind race winner Corey Day and runner-up Kvapil at Las Vegas, sparking optimism for Saturday’s race at Charlotte.
“We were really good here in the spring,” said Love, who finished second to full-time NASCAR Cup Series driver Ross Chastain in a rain-shortened race in May. “It fits our package.
“We learned some things last week in Las Vegas that we will implement in Charlotte and go from there. I think we’re struggling with some things that, if we fix for Charlotte, we’ll be in good shape.”
The top six drivers in The Chase standings remain within striking distance of Creed’s lead. Sixth-place Sam Mayer, who has gained four positions in the standings since The Chase presented by Mobil 1 began, is 52 points behind Creed.
Scoring 75 of a possible 76 points in a dominating victory two weeks ago at Kansas Speedway, Kaden Honeycutt seized control of the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Chase presented by Mobil 1, as top-seeded Layne Riggs suffered devastating issues for the second consecutive race.
Honeycutt will try to expand his lead in Friday’s Ecosave 200 (5 p.m. ET, FOX, NASCAR Racing Network, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio), as Riggs — now 37 points behind Honeycutt in second place — attempts to right his ship.
Riggs was running second behind Honeycutt at Kansas when he smacked the wall in the closing laps and dropped to 19th at the finish.
“I just went for it there at the end,” Riggs said. “I feel like we were kind of behind the eight ball all day long. Had rough stops on pit road, had issues. I was going for a win, had a shot at a win, and tried a little too hard. So definitely really disappointing. Really big blow to our points.
“Should have been just fine with chalking up a second-place finish instead of trying to go for the win. But at the same time, the team (Front Row Motorsports) pays me to go win races. And that’s what we did. I just have to be smarter in the long run if I’m going to get this thing. Keep my head about me a little bit better, instead of looking at just three or four laps. Got to look at the whole Chase.”
The good news for Riggs is that he and Honeycutt have created separation from the rest of the Chase field in just two races. Third-place Chandler Smith, Riggs’ teammate, trails Honeycutt by 71 points, with fourth-place Gio Ruggiero 72 points back.
