See where your favorite NASCAR Cup Series and NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series drivers will pit this weekend at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway.
NASCAR Cup Series
Enjoy Illinois 300 at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway on Sunday (3 p.m. ET, USA Network, HBO Max, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Nu Way 225 Powered by Bobcat and Sauced by Blues Hog at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway on Saturday (7:30 p.m. ET, The CW, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Editor’s Note: Keep tabs on this page for lineup advice following qualifying, including changes you should consider.
Team Penske was in another ZIP code on Saturday at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway, with Joey Logano winning the Busch Light Pole Award by nearly three-tenths of a second, the largest margin in nearly a decade (Chicagoland Speedway, 2017). Ryan Blaney and Josh Berry were both sporty in practice, as the three cars led the way in single-lap speed. Hendrick Motorsports has clearly improved its flatter-track program, with Kyle Larson and Chase Elliott cracking the top eight in qualifying. While Berry and Austin Cindric will take the green flag in the teens, both showed potential over the long haul in practice.
Starting five: Ryan Blaney, Joey Logano, Christopher Bell, Ty Gibbs, Josh Berry. Garage pick: Austin Cindric.
With The Chase presented by Mobil 1 opener in the books, the championship picture is beginning to take shape. The top seven drivers have separated themselves from eighth place, where Joey Logano and Chase Elliott are tied, 72 points back of the lead. But the No. 22 team remains a serious threat this weekend at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway and could make a significant dent in that points deficit if Logano continues to deliver at tracks where he has historically excelled, as he did in recent visits to North Wilkesboro Speedway and Richmond Raceway.
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.
Driver: Joey Logano, Team Penske, No. 22 Ford Selections remaining: 5 Comment: Because of Logano’s tenacity, don’t count the No. 22 team out yet. He is the standard at Gateway, scoring top-five finishes in all four races at the 1.25-mile oval. No other driver has even finished inside the top 10 in all four tries.
Driver:Denny Hamlin, Joe Gibbs Racing, No. 11 Toyota Selections remaining: 4 Comment: Knowing that Toyotas have ruled intermediates this season, you may want to save Hamlin for upcoming races at Kansas Speedway and Las Vegas Motor Speedway. But his St. Louis numbers aren’t too shabby either, with a victory and two runner-up finishes in the last three starts. A big part of that is track position at a track where he’s never qualified worse than sixth. Entering the weekend, Hamlin won’t be in my lineup.
Driver: Ryan Blaney, Team Penske, No. 12 Ford Selections remaining: 5 Comment: Gateway has similar characteristics to New Hampshire Motor Speedway, where Blaney was dominant last month. Blaney is the only driver to lead laps in all four races at Gateway, and was a lap away from victory when the No. 12 car ran out of fuel coming to the white flag in 2024. He coasted around to finish 24th, but the other three attempts have all resulted in finishes of sixth or better.
Chris Graythen | Getty Images
DRIVERS TO AVOID
Driver: Tyler Reddick, No. 45 Toyota Selections remaining: 4 Comment: Reddick has returned to his consistent ways the last two weeks, scoring consecutive top fives for the first time since May. However, the No. 45 team tends to struggle at flatter tracks, though Reddick placed eighth at New Hampshire. In four Gateway starts, he has one finish better than 16th (fourth, 2024).
Driver: Chase Elliott, Hendrick Motorsports, No. 9 Chevrolet Selections remaining: 5 Comment: Hendrick has improved its flat-track program, but the No. 9 team limped into The Chase and that volatility continued with a 14th-place finish at Darlington Raceway. Since winning at Texas Motor Speedway in early May, Elliott has two top-10 finishes in the last 16 races. On the bright side, Elliott finished third here last year, his only finish better than 13th in three starts (suspended for Gateway in 2023).
Meg Oliphant | Getty Images
SLEEPERS OF THE WEEK
Driver:Austin Cindric, Team Penske, No. 2 Ford Selections remaining: 5 Comment: Cindric was the beneficiary of Blaney running on fumes in 2024, scoring his second Cup victory. Penske has the best flat-track program in the game, and the No. 2 team cracked the top five recently at Richmond. Cindric’s 11.0 average finish at Gateway is his best among active Cup tracks.
Driver:Michael McDowell, Spire Motorsports, No. 71 Chevrolet Selections remaining: 5 Comment: McDowell’s statistics at Gateway aren’t exactly eye-popping, but his 74 laps led are his most at any non-drafting track. He finished ninth here in 2023 and captured the pole in 2024. More importantly, his 16.5 average finish is his best among all ovals on the schedule.
Meg Oliphant | Getty Images
FEATURED MATCHUPS
Christopher Bell vs. Denny Hamlin
Pick: Hamlin Comment: If each race played out differently, Bell could have won the last two races at Gateway. He experienced engine gremlins in 2024 and couldn’t reach the front last year with one of the best cars. Hamlin has shown the ability to capitalize at Gateway and needs a bounce-back weekend from Darlington.
Ryan Blaney vs. Kyle Larson
Pick: Blaney Comment: Larson is a formidable opponent for Blaney this weekend, never finishing worse than 12th in four Gateway starts. However, he also only has a single finish better than 10th. That’s not going to be enough to outduel Blaney, who is among the race favorites entering the weekend.
Joey Logano vs. Austin Cindric
Pick: Logano Comment: Don’t overlook Cindric this weekend, but this is a grueling matchup for the No. 2 team. Logano is the bar at Gateway, never finishing worse than fifth. With the recent excellence of the No. 22 bunch, it’s tough seeing that change this weekend.
Carson Hocevar vs. Brad Keselowski
Pick: Keselowski Comment: Keselowski is probably on the short list of drivers that Hocevar shouldn’t have upset during his postseason run. The 2012 Cup champion has nothing to lose, coming up short of making The Chase. Neither driver has particularly excelled at the Midwest track, but Keselowski showed upside by finishing third in 2024.
MY LINEUP
Starting five: Joey Logano, Ryan Blaney, Christopher Bell, Ty Gibbs, Austin Cindric. Garage: Josh Berry.
36 FOR 36
Pick: Austin Cindric, Team Penske, No. 2 Ford Comment: With only a quarter of the 2026 campaign remaining, options are beginning to run thin. But if you have a Penske car in the bank, this would be an ideal time to use it. Cindric is a former winner here, though he followed that up with a lousy 19th-place effort last year. I’ll take my chances.
MOORESVILLE, N.C. (Sept. 10, 2026) – Rick Ware Racing (RWR) will expand its already versatile motorsports presence by competing in the NASCAR Canada Series with a two-car effort beginning with the 2027 season.
The first driver named to the team is the “Iron Man” of Canada’s premier racing league, DJ Kennington, who will pilot the No. 51 Chevrolet. RWR’s second car will be the No. 15 Chevrolet, and that driver will be announced at a later date.
Kennington is the only driver to compete in every NASCAR Canada Series race, and he will make his 241st career start Saturday night in the 2026 season finale at Delaware Speedway in Ontario. The St. Thomas, Ontario, native is a two-time NASCAR Canada Series champion (2010 and 2012) and has a total of 25 wins, 126 top-fives and 202 top-10s, along with 17 poles and 3,969 laps led. Kennington has also finished among the top-three in points 13 times, including a record four runner-up results.
“I’ve been fortunate to have a long career in the NASCAR Canada Series, but I’ve always been more interested in what’s next, and this opportunity with Rick Ware Racing is something I’m really looking forward to,” Kennington said. “Rick has built a race team that competes in a lot of different forms of motorsports, and to be a part of his overall program means a lot to me. To do it with Castrol and Wakefield Canada makes it even more special. They’ve been with me since I was 16 years old. They’re family, and now we get to start another chapter together at RWR.”
Wakefield Canada, the manufacturer and distributor of Castrol-branded lubricants in Canada, has been with Kennington for every one of his NASCAR Canada Series milestones and then some. It’s a partnership that began with a 16-year-old Kennington at the outset of his racing career, and it will continue through the 2029 season at his new RWR home, extending the pairing to an incredible 35 years.
“DJ has been a fantastic ambassador for Castrol and Wakefield Canada for more than three decades. Extending our relationship through 2029 reflects the trust and success we’ve built together, while the addition of Rick Ware Racing creates new opportunities to elevate all three organizations,” said Rob Fifield, marketing director – automotive, Wakefield Canada. “By combining DJ’s connection with fans, Rick Ware Racing’s competitive platform and Castrol’s heritage in motorsports, everyone wins.”
The 2027 season will celebrate the 20th anniversary of the NASCAR Canada Series, and it will also serve as RWR’s return to the series. In 2021, RWR competed in the NASCAR Canada Series with a two-car lineup for drivers Andrew Ranger and Alex Guenette. Ranger scored two wins for RWR – Sept. 12 at Flamboro Speedway in Ontario and Sept. 26 at Delaware Speedway – on his way to a second-place finish in the final points standings, just eight points behind series champion LP Dumoulin. Guenette finished seventh in points with seven top-10s.
“We’ve wanted to get back to the NASCAR Canada Series, but it needed to be the right opportunity, and we feel like we have that with the two-car program we’re putting together for 2027,” said team owner Rick Ware. “DJ gives us a proven winner who knows this series inside and out, and we’re proud to represent Castrol and become part of the relationship they’ve built with DJ over the past three decades. We’re equally pleased with what we’re putting together for our second car, and we look forward to sharing more about that program when the time is right.”
The NASCAR Canada Series features a mix of road courses and tight short tracks, and its season runs May through September. Canadians can watch every race on REV TV, TVA Sports, TSN and YouTube. For those outside of Canada, coverage is provided on the NASCAR Canada Series YouTube channel.
Hendrick Motorsports announced Thursday that Corey Day has signed a long-term contract extension with the organization and will return to the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series in a full-time role for 2027, driving the No. 17 Chevrolet.
Day will also make his NASCAR Cup Series debut next year in a part-time role with the team. Details will be announced at a later date.
“What Corey has accomplished in such a short time is remarkable,” said Rick Hendrick, owner of Hendrick Motorsports, in a team statement. “He came to us with generational talent but almost no experience racing on pavement. The fact that he’s already competing for a championship at this level is extraordinary, and he’s just beginning to scratch the surface. We love Corey’s character and how he fits our organization, and we’re proud to have him with us for many years to come.”
Day earned his first national series victory at Talladega Superspeedway in April and followed it up with an impressive win at Dover Motor Speedway a month later. He qualified for the O’Reilly Series’ inaugural Chase — earning the No. 7 seed in his quest for the championship.
Day finished runner-up last weekend at Darlington to climb to fifth in The Chase standings with eight races to go in the 2026 season.
“There’s no substitute for seat time, which makes Corey’s progress even more impressive,” said Jeff Gordon, vice chairman of Hendrick Motorsports. “We see growth every weekend when he gets in the car. He puts in the work and isn’t afraid to ask questions and apply what he learns. The Cup races next year will give him another opportunity to gain valuable experience and challenge himself at the highest level. It’s going to be fun to watch.”
“When I joined Hendrick Motorsports, I knew I had a lot to learn. And I still do,” Day said. “But the people here have really embraced me and invested a lot of time in helping me grow, both as a driver and a person. Mr. and Mrs. Hendrick give us all the resources we could possibly need. I’m so grateful to them, Jeff Gordon, Jeff Andrews and the 500 teammates who put so much into our success. I’m focused on winning a championship together this year and bringing many more trophies home to Hendrick Motorsports in the future.”
Carson Hocevar has shown no remorse about earning enemies instead of respect in the NASCAR Cup Series.
On the surface, it seemed his latest on-track misstep might cause the most significant pause in his young racing career. Instead, after a 44-minute news teleconference on Wednesday afternoon, “The Hurricane” maintained this is business as usual for the 23-year-old driver of the No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet.
This time, Hocevar drew the ire of RFK Racing co-owner and driver Brad Keselowski when he sent Keselowski spinning at Lap 107 to end Stage 1 at Darlington Raceway in the opening race of The Chase presented by Mobil 1.
Keselowski was clear in his post-race remarks: “His day is coming, and it’s coming hard. Watch out, Carson.”
And yet Hocevar offered his typical laissez-faire response to both spinning Keselowski and the hinted retribution from the 2012 NASCAR Cup Series champion.
“He spun. I don’t know what happened. He spun,” Hocevar told USA Sports. In a separate interview, he added: “I’ll tighten my belts,” coupled with the tone of a sarcastic eye roll.
On Wednesday, two-and-a-half days removed from the incident, Hocevar was willing to expound on his perspective, but still in a casual fashion.
“[Expletive]happenssometimeswhenwe’reracinghard,right?” Hocevar said. “Like, I thinkBradknewhowaggressivehewasbeing, racingsuperhard,obviouslytryingtokeepusbehindhim.Iwasracingreallyhard,tryingtobeaggressiveandjusttrying to hurthismomentumalot.Andwejustgotracingreallyhard,right?AndIfeellikeyouputyourselfinthatspotthatit’sgoingtoopenupafter10or15lapsof —notpatiencerunningout,becauseitjustsoundslikeI’mjusttryingtoturnhimafter15lapsandbelike, ‘Allright,I’mdonewithyou,’right?Butit’smoresowhenyou’rejustracingreally,reallytightwithinaninchofeachotherfor10, 12,13, 14,15laps, it just starts to add to the intensity of it and running really hard, and sometimes you just hit.”
The problem for Hocevar is one that has been shouted from the rooftops of the NASCAR garage since his days of making enemies in the Craftsman Truck Series back in 2023: Hocevar has shown little respect, so he has earned little respect.
According to Racing Insights, there have been 16 Cup race weekends since the start of the 2025 season that Hocevar has landed in run-ins with at least one driver. In a 63-race period, that marks a rate of 25.4% — one in every four starts. Those incidents vary from his former Truck Series rival Corey Heim to past Cup champions like Keselowski, Joey Logano, Ryan Blaney and the late Kyle Busch.
Hocevar has defended his racing style wholeheartedly, pointing to his childhood memories of the sport as his driving motivator today.
“I just want to be the race-car driver I would’ve wanted to be a fan of,” Hocevar said in a July 12 appearance on the TNT Sports pre-race show. “So I feel like I owe that to myself and I’ve got to be true to myself and the 5-year-old kid that fell in love with NASCAR, not everybody else that’s basically trying to ruin my dreams of being good, right? Like, they all want that for themselves. So at some point, we’ve all got to be selfish, and I don’t want to get out-selfished basically.”
Hocevar said Wednesday he stands by that outlook, and that has resonated with the fans watching from afar, interacting with Hocevar and his content on social media while also nabbing his merchandise. Following Darlington, the third-year Cup racer offered a discount on his website to mark all items 23% off in honor of how many positions he gained in Sunday’s race. After seeing continued chatter about Keselowski’s comments, Hocevar added an extra 6% off for six hours in honor of Keselowski’s car number.
According to Sports Business Journal, Hocevar’s website “approached nearly $200,000 in sales” in a 24-hour span.
“It’sbeenafacetofthegame for forever.It’sNASCARhowwe’veallknownitforaslongasI’vebeenalive,andpeoplewellbeforeIwasborn,too. Welovethefans.Weenjoyit.Welovethetalkingpointsaboutusandbeingrelevantandustryingtogofastandbein The Chaseandbeingrelevant.”
Jonathan Bachman | Getty Images
Therein lies much of the source of his competitors’ umbrage. Hocevar has just one win on his Cup Series resume — a rousing victory at Talladega Superspeedway that culminated in a spectacular celebration, followed one week later by an appearance at the Met Gala in New York City.
But from current on-track opponents to Hall of Famers watching and analyzing in media roles today, there aren’t many racers — if any — who are fond of Hocevar’s approach.
Kevin Harvick, the 2014 Cup Series champion and a Class of 2027 NASCAR Hall of Fame electee, said on his “Kevin Harvick’s Happy Hour” podcast this week, “he doesn’t know how to play the game.”
“Right now, he’s worried about selling T-shirts and all the things that goes with it,” Harvick said. “You have to be respected by the guys you’re racing against. And right now, there’s not one guy in the garage that respects what he does behind the wheel.”
Denny Hamlin has yet to have a direct run-in with Hocevar, but has seen enough from afar — and a perceived desire for attention from Hocevar — that he opted not to opine on Sunday’s incident with Keselowski directly.
“I’m not going to give him what he wants. I’m not going to give him the clip that he wants. Period,” Hamlin said on Dirty Mo Media’s “Actions Detrimental” podcast. “You want me to talk about Spire? I’ll talk about Spire. There’s no adults in the room, clearly, in that building. No adults. That’s my opinion. Because how can you honestly think that that’s what’s best for your company if you’re running a serious organization? I think they’re unserious.”
2027 Hall of Fame electee Jeff Burton and Hall of Famer Dale Jarrett expressed similar disdain for Hocevar’s lack of respect on the USA Network post-race show following the Southern 500 at Darlington.
Regardless of the conversations that swirl around him, Hocevar said Wednesday he only puts stock into what team owner Jeff Dickerson says and the people within the walls of Spire Motorsports.
“I thinkalotofpeoplemisinterpretmehavingfunorourteamhavingfunandbeingmaybeunseriousattimes,thatwedon’tcare,” Hocevar said. “AndIthinkultimately,wejustwanttoenjoyeveryaspectofthegame,andpartofthegameislovinguptothefans.Imean,there’sareasonwedodriverintros.It’sthereasonwedoallthisstuff.It’s the reasonwe’reoutthereinthemerchtrailer.It’sthereasondriversaresoavailable.It’safacetofthegame, andweenjoythatandwelovethat.Butalso, too,welovegoingasfastaspossibleandenjoyingit. …
As it stands, Hocevar enters 12th in the NASCAR Cup Series points standings for Sunday’s second race of The Chase at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway (3 p.m. ET, USA Network, HBO Max, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). Hocevar is one of just 16 drivers still eligible to win the 2026 Cup Series championship, currently 89 points behind series leader Hamlin with nine races remaining. He knows he and his team aren’t the “dominant car” right now, he said. That has led to a “house money” mantra shared among the No. 77 team entering The Chase.
Of course, Hocevar still says winning the championship is the ultimate goal. But the fun of the fandom is what’s really driving him forward.
“Everybody that I hear (when) they win a championship, they never really tell the story of the race,” Hocevar said. “They always tell the story of what it was like after or before, with all their guys, or with all their people, with all their friends, with all their family. So the fans are just another element to that, in my opinion. I think it has to go together personally.”
The question remains whether the championship is tangible for Hocevar if he continues to frustrate the drivers he is trying to beat.
The top two drivers in the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series standings would just as soon forget last year’s race at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway.
Both Justin Allgaier and Sheldon Creed, however, will have a chance at redemption when the series returns to the 1.25-mile track for Saturday’s Nu Way 225 Powered by Bobcat and Sauced by Blues Hog (7:30 p.m. ET, The CW, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
In last year’s race, Creed lost third gear on a Lap 135 restart, stacked up the field in a multicar accident and ultimately finished 30th. Allgaier was nicked with a pit road speeding penalty at the end of the second stage, suffered damage in the Lap 135 crash and finished 28th.
Creed, at least, comes to the banks of the Mississippi River with considerable momentum. In last Saturday’s O’Reilly Series Chase presented by Mobil 1 opener at Darlington Raceway, the driver of the No. 00 Haas Factory Team Chevrolet picked up the second win of his career and trimmed Allgaier’s lead in the standings to seven points.
Allgaier, on the other hand, started strong and won the first stage, but contact with the outside wall cost him dearly in the late going, dropping him to 17th at the finish with an ill-handling car.
In a field that includes no former Gateway winners, both Creed and Allgaier are hopeful for better results. For Allgaier, from Riverton, Illinois, the race is a home game of sorts.
“It’s always special to be able to come back and race this close to home — not only for me, but for everyone at (sponsor) Brandt Professional Agriculture as well,” said Allgaier, who won a pole at WWT Raceway in 2010. “They are going to have a strong presence at the track this weekend, and hopefully we can go out there and put on a great show for them.
“(Crew chief) Andrew (Overstreet) and all the guys on this team have been working hard all week long, and we are ready to go.”
Allgaier’s JR Motorsports teammate Carson Kvapil — third in the Chase standings and 19 points back after running 12th from the pole at Darlington — likewise has work to do at Gateway. Kvapil finished 37th in his only start there last year after an engine failure.
“We’ve been working hard in the sim this week preparing for St. Louis,” Kvapil said. “I know (crew chief) Rodney (Childers) and this entire No. 1 Wilde Cracker team will unload another rocket ship at the track this weekend.
“We just need to go out and execute like we know we can, and if we do, we will continue to chip away at the points deficit.”
The Chase driver who had the best result in last year’s race is Brandon Jones, who finished fourth. Jones is eighth in the standings after Darlington, 58 points behind Allgaier.
Richard Childress Racing’s Jesse Love, the defending series champion, finished fifth last year. Love is sixth in the standings after the Chase opener, trailing Allgaier by 48 points.
One note of caution for Creed. In the 10-year history of postseason racing in the O’Reilly Series, never has the winner of the postseason opener gone on to win the title.
Everything was set up for Denny Hamlin to succeed going into the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series Chase presented by Mobil 1 … until The Chase actually started, that is.
Two-thirds of the way through Sunday’s Chase opener at Darlington Raceway, Hamlin was running at the edge of the top 15 when Michael McDowell bumped him into the wall and damaged his toe links, noticeably affecting the No. 11 car’s performance the rest of the night. It ended up transforming a race where Hamlin led nearly 20% of all laps (and had an average running position of 9.01) and reducing it to an 18th-place finish, worse than 12 of his 15 fellow Chase drivers.
With just a single Chase result in the books, Hamlin’s points lead shrunk from 25 over second place (and 50 over sixth place) to just 12 over second-ranked teammate Christopher Bell (and 39 over sixth-ranked teammate Ty Gibbs). It also immediately put a real dent in Denny’s odds to finally win his first career Cup championship.
But how down should Hamlin be feeling after Darlington? Did the mid-race scuff-up really ruin his title hopes before they barely even began? And is this just par for the course for a driver whose career has been littered with missed opportunities to win the title that every other name around him on the career wins list already has?
Certainly, Hamlin’s unfortunate incident Sunday was the latest in a long line of moments that make one wonder what it is about the No. 11 and the postseason, whether in The Chase (old or new) or the playoffs. But is the perception of Hamlin’s proneness to mishaps at this phase of the season fair? In years where he made the playoffs/Chase during his career, Hamlin has an average Driver Rating of 95.8 in the regular season, versus 96.2 in the postseason. That’s obviously not a huge difference at all.
However, if we adjust for his predicted performance — based on track type, recent history, team performance and affinity for each particular track — that regular-season figure is 0.8 higher than expected, while the postseason number is 1.5 lower than expected, meaning Hamlin does slightly worse relative to expectations in the crucible of the late-season stretch run for the championship.
The same goes for when we dig into specific sub-groups of postseason races. Hamlin’s performance in postseason openers, like Darlington, falls by 2.4 points of Driver Rating relative to pre-race expectations, and his performances at elimination races under the old playoff system dipped by 0.9 points versus expectations. In other words, there is some truth to the reputation that Hamlin can’t get out of his own way in important moments along the path to that elusive championship.
That being said, even a Driver Rating that runs 1.5 points below expectations is pretty solid when you’re as good as Hamlin is at baseline. That 96.2 postseason rating from before still ranks 10th-best among qualified Cup drivers in years they competed for the championship, sandwiched between Martin Truex Jr./Christopher Bell and William Byron/Ryan Blaney. None is near the level of notable clutch maestro Jimmie Johnson at 104.9, of course, but that’s why J.J. has those seven trophies and Denny has zero (for now).
The good news for Hamlin in that department is that, while the difficult run Sunday absolutely hurt his odds to win the 2026 title, he still can make a strong case as the championship favorite from here.
For one thing, he is still The Chase points leader. While his edge on the rest of the field got sliced roughly in half with just one off-night, Hamlin’s 12-point margin over No. 2 Bell is actually the third-widest gap between any two spots on The Chase leaderboard — trailing only No. 7 Kyle Larson’s margin to No. 8 Joey Logano (23 points) and No. 4 Tyler Reddick’s margin to No. 5 Chase Briscoe (13 points).
The other thing Hamlin has on his side continues to be superior track fit compared with the rest of The Chase field … though that factor is waning some.
As we pointed out last week, the remaining tracks on the 2026 schedule are disproportionately good venues for Denny, matching his strengths — many intermediates and flat tracks — and minimizing his weaknesses — zero road courses and only one superspeedway. That meant he had the best “home-field advantage” of any Chase driver, in terms of how much better he projected to be in the postseason than at a generic, average Cup site from the full-season schedule. And that’s still true after Sunday:
It is less true now, though: His gap in “home-field” over the rest of The Chase is nowhere near as much of an outlier as it was going in, another illustration of what a missed opportunity his miscue at Darlington represented.
And now comes the opportunity for Denny to rebuild the edge he held just a week ago. Gateway is a very good track for Hamlin — in addition to chief rivals Blaney and Bell — which means the pressure is on to break his trend of undershooting expectations at this exact type of race. At the same time, though, we have to resist the urge to overreact to one mediocre finish that didn’t even knock Denny out of first place in the standings.
The true test of Hamlin’s title bona fides was always going to come in a few more weeks, during the Kansas-Las Vegas-Charlotte intermediate block of the schedule. But he does have to avoid more runs like Sunday’s in order to make those opportunities on the 1.5-mile ovals really count toward his first-ever championship bid.
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The NASCAR Cup Series and O’Reilly Auto Parts Series continue their respective Chases presented by Mobil 1 this weekend at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway. Both series have 36 entries, meaning no drivers will fail to qualify. Single-car, single-lap qualifying will set the starting lineups for both races. See the qualifying orders for Gateway here.
NEW YORK —Tuesday evening, The NASCAR Foundation celebrated two decades of giving back to racing communities, hosting The NASCAR Foundation 20th Anniversary Honors Gala at the Ziegfeld Ballroom in New York City.
The Gala was hosted by The Foundation and the France family in collaboration with the evening’s Leadership Sponsors, including Brown & Brown, Kaulig Racing, Hendrick Motorsports and Next League.
The NASCAR Foundation
Various current and former NASCAR drivers, team owners and executives, as well as special guests across the sports and entertainment industry, were in attendance, including Emmy and Tony Award-winning actress and singer, Kristin Chenoweth and Pro Football Hall of Famer and Emmy and Peabody Award-winning journalist Michael Strahan.
During the evening’s celebrations, The NASCAR Foundation honored Chief Executive Officer and Executive Producer of FOX Sports Eric Shanks with the Champion for Children Award as well as the Chairman of the Board of The NASCAR Foundation Mike Helton with the Founders Award.
The evening culminated with the announcement of the 16th annual Betty Jane France Humanitarian Award winner, Lyette Reback, founder and volunteer of Believe With Me. The winner’s nonprofit organization supports families of fallen military service members by providing financial help and emotional support.
“Lyette is the kind of person who doesn’t just talk about making a difference, she gets to work and makes it happen,” said Nichole Krieger, Vice President and Executive Director, The NASCAR Foundation. “As a mother of 16, she has a huge heart, and she has made it her mission to make sure the children of our fallen heroes know they are remembered and cared for. It’s that reason which makes Lyette such a deserving recipient of the Betty Jane France Humanitarian Award. We’re thrilled to celebrate her and the incredible work she continues to do.”
The 20th Anniversary celebrations continue Wednesday, Sept. 9, with The Speedy Bear Brigade Powered by Kaulig Giving, where drivers and representatives from both The NASCAR Foundation and Kaulig Racing will deliver NASCAR-themed Speedy Bears to children at Hassenfeld Children’s Hospital at NYU Langone.
