Posted on by Reid Spencer

AUSTIN, Texas — With a bold, brilliant move moments after the final restart of Saturday’s Focused Health 250 at Circuit of the Americas, Shane van Gisbergen once again exhibited his road course supremacy.

Taking the inside line into Turn 1 after the restart with five laps left, van Gisbergen made a four-wide pass for the lead from the sixth position and pulled away to win the fifth NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts race of his career, this time by 0.780 seconds over runner-up Austin Hill.

RELATED: Race results | At-track photos

In a rough-and-tumble event with more than its share of contact, van Gisbergen led five times for 31 laps, including the last five after the decisive move, as then-leader and Stage 2 winner Sam Mayer ran wide in the first corner, clearing the inside lane for the winning pass.

“I was a bit unsure there, starting sixth on the outside,” van Gisbergen said. “I kind of got to the inside, which was good, and nosed in on the 41 (Mayer), and he reacted. When he reacted, I thought no way he’s stopping that, and he kind of pushed everyone wide, which was awesome, and it worked out for us.”

The win was SVG’s first at COTA in his second O’Reilly Auto Parts Series race at the track. He is winless in two NASCAR Cup Series starts at the Texas road course.

“I’ve always been fast here but never managed to win,” van Gisbergen said. “So I’m pretty stoked to finally get it done — pretty flawless day.”

Van Gisbergen’s victory was the 10th straight on road courses for JR Motorsports and the 106th for the organization overall.

Austin Hill’s runner-up finish was his third in five starts at the 2.4-mile track.

“I made a lot of mistakes out there today, but that’s going to happen on these road courses,” said Hill, the series points leader through three races. “Stage 2, I was struggling a little bit, just trying to figure out what I needed to be better.

“That (last) restart, I did a really good job getting left. As soon as they went off into the corner, I knew that they were going to slide up, and I was able to file in there in second, and then I had to go to work on SVG.

“He’s just so good at the first three laps of a run. He can really get away. I was struggling a little bit with front turn for the first two or three laps, and he kind of got that gap and was able to manage from there. Hats off to those guys. A better guy beat us today.”

In a race billed as a matchup between van Gisbergen and pole winner Connor Zilisch, Sammy Smith finished third, followed by Jesse Love and Corey Day, as Zilisch suffered a litany of issues that dropped him to 21st at the end.

After Zilisch led 12 laps during the first stage, the left-rear brake rotor on his No. 1 Chevrolet sheared, and the 19-year-old prodigy quickly dropped through the field. After stopping for repairs to the rear brakes, Zilisch started the final stage in 29th but just as rapidly worked his way forward.

With fewer than three laps left, he had just cleared Day’s No. 17 Chevrolet for fourth when contact from Day’s car sent Zilisch spinning to damage his Camaro.

WATCH: Zilisch wants an apology from Day

“He got right in front of me there, and as soon as he did, he crossed over my nose, I lost a little bit of what I had left (of front turn),” Day said. “It wasn’t intentional. I didn’t want to wreck him.”

The accident ruined Zilisch’s impressive charge from the back of the field.

“Really unfortunate,” Zilisch said. “Hopefully, he can figure it out … All I want is an apology, but he just stands over there and stares at me and makes it worse. But he’ll figure it out.”

Seventeen-year-old Brent Crews finished sixth in his series debut after taking the lead on the Stage 2 restart. Crews is the first driver under 18 to lead laps in the series since Casey Atwood accomplished the feat in 1998.

William Sawalich, Justin Allgaier, Ross Chastain and Brennan Poole completed the top 10.

The O’Reilly Series heads west next Saturday for the Govx 200 at Phoenix Raceway (7:30 p.m. ET, The CW, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

NOTE: Inspection in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series garage was completed with no issues, confirming van Gisbergen as the winner.

Posted on by Zack Albert

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series competed in a new venue Saturday in the streets of St. Petersburg, and a handful of tour veterans took to the place. Layne Riggs’ star burned the brightest in victory, and ThorSport teammates Ty Majeski and Ben Rhodes gave a gallant, proper chase.

A pair of IndyCar veterans, however, held their own in one-off starts, making the most of their home-court advantage in unfamiliar vehicles.

James Hinchcliffe rallied from a host of on-track issues in Saturday’s OnlyBulls Green Flag 150, netting a strong top-10 finish in his Truck Series debut. Another St. Pete pro, 52-year-old IndyCar champ Dario Franchitti, ran top 10 for the majority of the day before damage to his No. 1 Tricon Garage Toyota knocked him from contention.

RELATED: Race results | At-track photos: COTA, St. Pete

At the end of the sunny, warm afternoon, both drivers were spent. Hinchcliffe sat on the exterior pit wall alongside his No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet, drenched with water to cool off. Franchitti sought out shade as he sat in a Tricon pit stall and hydrated, a faulty helmet cooling system the cause of his fatigue after his 27th-place finish in his first NASCAR start since 2008.

Both, however, were all smiles — even after mid-race contact between the two — after the Truck Series’ first street-circuit race before a festival-capacity crowd.

“We had to learn a couple lessons the hard way, figure out these tires, figure out how to race some of these guys,” said Hinchcliffe, who adopted a “Jimmy Hinch” alter ego for the race weekend. “But by the third stage, I felt really good in the truck, even with a little bit of damage. That thing was that was humming along. So I wish I could start the race, like I did knowing what I knew at the start of Stage 3, but at the end of the day, just super thankful to Spire for the opportunity, and yeah, really happy to get out there and salvage the top 10 after going to the back a couple times.”

Hinchcliffe got his introduction to full-fendered racing in a hurry, rubbing sheet metal with both Riggs and Majeski in Stage 1, but he tumbled down the leaderboard in the next stanza with a Turn 10 off-course excursion after contact just after getting past Franchitti.

“I mean, the irony of it being him that hit us. It was almost funny,” Hinchcliffe said. “I was almost laughing in my helmet, but it seems kind of poetic. Seems appropriate. You know, honestly, I’m glad that he hit me and not a full-season guy that’s running for points. In some ways, that was a big thing.”

Another Hinchcliffe spin in Turn 5 of the 1.8-mile course seemed to sink his day with 23 of the 80 laps remaining, but his comeback effort was rewarded as he made use of fresh tires and an improved feel for the heavier stock-car style.

“You wouldn’t think necessarily in something like this, compared to a formula car, precision isn’t necessarily the first word that would come to mind, but you really have to,” Hinchcliffe said. “Credit to all the guys and girls that do this full-time. This is not an easy series, and it was a lot of fun to be part of it for a weekend.”

Dario Franchitti navigates the streets of St. Petersburg in the No. 1 Toyota
David Jensen | Getty Images

Franchitti’s day was a bit less eventful, though he informed his Tricon team at the race’s halfway mark that he needed a beverage and an ice pack, noting “this helmet fan is … not the best.” The unscheduled pit stop he made 24 laps later knocked him off the lead lap and outside the top 25.

If there was any rust from the driver who last competed full-time in IndyCar in 2013, it didn’t show in his nearly 20-year-later return to NASCAR. The endeavor stemmed, Franchitti said, from a wine-fueled conversation with close friend Jimmie Johnson, who helped make the arrangement through his sponsor and manufacturer connections to get him in Tricon equipment for St. Pete.

While the chance to race in a NASCAR national series was a privilege, Franchitti said the one-off start provided another opportunity for a homecoming.

“The special thing for me is my family are here,” Franchitti said. “My wife, my daughters have never seen me race anything but historic cars and we’ve had a blast doing that. My mom and dad are here, and there’s also my IndyCar family. Everybody I worked with, everybody I’ve known in the paddock since I was a kid. The fans, all that. That’s what makes this, for me, so, so special. I had a great truck. I really did. I wish I hadn’t done so much damage to it, but that was just my inexperience in the truck, catching me out.”

The finishing outcome, Johnson said, was almost a side note to his overall performance.

“I just can’t overstate how well of a job he did,” Johnson said on pit road. “I mean, it’s so tough to come into this series and drive with the regulars, and I think the first part of the race, he built a lot of respect amongst the competitors around him. They were respectful at the end as we got down to the point in time where yellows come out, and he just did an incredible job. Of course, you want a little better result, and that’s where his head is, what he’s thinking about, but I know once that competitive nature kind of goes away and he reflects on the weekend, he has a lot to be proud of.”

The question that lingered was whether the experience was enough to bring both IndyCar vets back to the NASCAR world in the future. When Franchitti mentioned a braking issue, Johnson slipped in a sly hint about the adjustments the team could make for next time. “Next time?” Johnson recalled Franchitti saying. “We’ll see. It’s more on him than on me. I’d love to do it again with him.”

Count Hinchcliffe in as well: “It’d be pretty hard to say no at this point,” he said, with a hopeful note that NASCAR could return to St. Petersburg for a second go-around.

“Oh man, if they don’t come back to St Pete, I think that’d be a real shame,” Hinchcliffe said. “I mean, I didn’t see exactly what’s happening up front, but from where I sat, it seemed like a pretty exciting race, so hopefully everyone in the stands enjoyed it, and we’ll see the Truck Series back here again next year.”

Posted on by Cameron Richardson

Track: Circuit of The Americas
Location: Austin, Texas
Track length: 2.4 miles
When: 3:30 p.m. ET
Where to tune in: FOX, HBO Max, FOX One, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio
Race purse: $11,233,037
Race distance: 95 laps | 228.0 miles
Stages: 20 | 45 | 95
Sunday’s starting lineup | Cup Series pit-stall assignments

Shane van Gisbergen or the field on Sunday?

“Raise your hand if you thought I’d be the highest-qualifying Trackhouse driver?”

Few raised their hand to Ross Chastain’s question as he put his No. 1 Chevrolet second aside polesitter Tyler Reddick at Circuit of The Americas, the first NASCAR Cup Series road-course race of 2026.

Of course, all eyes are on New Zealand’s Shane van Gisbergen as he eyes a sixth consecutive road-course win, which would match Jeff Gordon’s record set between 1997 and 2000.

However, van Gisbergen has yet to grab the checkered flag in two Cup starts at the road course on the outskirts of the Texas capitol. He finished sixth last year, his only shortcoming on the left- and right-turn circuits in 2025. But even amid a ludicrous and dominant win streak, there is still confidence from SVG’s fellow competitors that it can end sooner rather than later.

“There’s no doubt he’s the very best on top of his game, but he’s beatable,” Michael McDowell said Saturday. “We haven’t yet, but we will. It will happen. It will not go on forever. I hope I don’t eat my words. This is probably the one that he’s beatable at, just because he hasn’t been as dominant speed-wise as he has at the other ones.

“It’s amazing what he’s done. It really is, there’s no doubt about it. It’s amazing. It’s humbling for all of us drivers, and it makes us all work harder, and that’s great. Marcos Ambrose did the same thing. AJ Allmendinger did the same thing, and before him, it was Ron Fellows and Max Papis and those guys that push everyone to be better, too, right? The sport’s always evolving, and you’re always pushing yourself to be better, and he has made everybody be better.”

A handful of road-course savants got the upper hand on van Gisbergen in qualifying as the No. 97 Trackhouse driver’s effort Saturday morning was only good enough to start 13th. Chase Elliott, NASCAR’s most-winning active driver on road courses, will start fifth. Three-time Cup winner Allmendinger starts seventh. Including Elliott (2021), all former Cup winners at COTA will start in front of van Gisbergen as well, with Reddick (2023) and Chastain (2022) on the front row, Christopher Bell (2025) rolling off eighth and William Byron (2024) rounding out the top 10 on the starting grid.

MORE: Schedule, TV info: COTA

In the details …

Tyler Reddick became the sixth driver to win the opening two races of the NASCAR Cup Series season by winning the Daytona 500 and last week’s race at EchoPark Speedway. None of the previous five drivers were able to win three in a row to begin the campaign. Will Reddick become the first? Here’s how the previous five drivers fared:
DriverYearTrack of third raceResults in third race
Marvin Panch1957Titusville3rd
Bob Welborn1959Daytona41st
David Pearson1976Rockingham29th
Jeff Gordon1997Richmond4th
Matt Kenseth2009Las Vegas43rd

Speed reads

Race-day essentials:

• COTA hub: Key information, links, results | Read more
• Paint Scheme Preview: Fresh designs for the first Texas trip of 2026 | View gallery
• Hauler Talk: New track limits highlight COTA discourse | Listen now
• Power Rankings: Cup Series’ top 20 drivers after EchoPark | This week’s ranks
• NASCAR Classics: Inside the video vault from COTA | Watch now
• Sunday Setup: See what crew chiefs have in mind for 95 laps around the course | Read more

Contributing: Zach Sturniolo | NASCAR.com

Posted on by Dustin Albino

AUSTIN, Texas — The picturesque scenes of the historic Circuit of The Americas road course make for a beautiful visual leading into Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race there (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). So too do differing in-race strategies, not knowing which is ultimately playing out the best until the closing laps.

Since the implementation of stage racing nearly a decade ago, the dominant car at road courses, more often than not, has elected to forego earning maximum stage points and pit late in the opening two stages to be in position for the win come the end of the race. On the flip side, cars that weren’t in position to win on that given day tend to chase stage points, pit during the stage break and attempt to drive through the field in the final stint.

MORE: COTA starting lineup | At-track photos: COTA, St. Pete

With The Chase format returning in 2026, every point matters. Every strategy call is heightened, particularly at road courses where stage points can be more evenly spread throughout the field.

“I don’t think it’s going to be a ton different from what we’ve had in the past,” Stephen Doran, crew chief for Shane van Gisbergen, told NASCAR.com. “I think you will see a few more stay out and collect the stage points. I think your top two or three contenders will play it to win the race.”

Van Gisbergen and Doran brutalized the competition on road courses in 2025 by winning each of the last five road races, and on Sunday, SVG could match Jeff Gordon’s record of six consecutive road-course triumphs. The team was so dominant that despite winning a handful of times as a rookie on road courses, SVG was still able to tally the second-most amount of stage points (62), trailing only Ryan Blaney (64). No other driver in the field eclipsed 40.

Being among the top teams in collecting stage points is something that Doran believes could flip in 2026, noting that more teams in the middle of the field will look to pocket points. Those points could come to the detriment of the No. 97 bunch.

“I don’t think you’re going to have that as much anymore because all of those guys in the midpack that see that they can get stage points are going to stay out and get them,” Doran said. “I don’t think it’s going to be as easy to collect seven or eight stage points and short the stage.”

Shane van Gisbergen drives at COTA.
James Gilbert | Getty Images

In overall points accumulated at road courses last year, van Gisbergen had a 73-point buffer over runner-up Christopher Bell. Even with attention on points in 2026, the goal remains to capture the checkered flag, something Doran hasn’t lost sight of, no matter how many stage points the No. 97 team leaves on the table. Those points tend to even out with a victory as the race winner earns 55 points, a 15-point increase per race from 2025.

“We come here for one reason, and that’s to bring the trophy home,” Doran said. “I’m never going to do anything that jeopardizes that.”

Meanwhile, Jonathan Hassler, Blaney’s 2023 championship-winning crew chief, thinks sacrificing points is a tough call “when you’re not Shane van Gisbergen.” But if a team is far enough back in the running order that stage points seem unlikely — but far enough ahead of the leader where they won’t lose a lap — it’s an easier call to flip the stages.

“It’s an easy decision when you’re back in the pack,” Hassler told NASCAR.com. “You are just trying to get through the day, get the most points you can. It’s harder for someone who is second, third or fourth.”

Looking ahead to Sunday, Hassler, who guided Blaney to a fourth-place starting position for Sunday’s DuraMax Texas Grand Prix, believes the top three drivers in the running order will battle each other for track position throughout the race, giving up the opportunity to bank points during the stages. Beyond the podium, it could boil down to how long a given run is, since it’s easier to flip the stage on a short run, with the margin between the field not as spread out.

“You come in with some expectations of the capability of your car and where you should be running and understand the picture of if you’re in position to get points now or not,” Hassler stated. “If I make a move now, will it set me up to get points in the second stage?

“I think if you do your homework and know what kind of speed you have in your car and where you’re running, it’s fairly straightforward.”

Van Gisbergen will take the green flag from 13th on Sunday, his worst starting spot in 12 road-course starts.

Ryan Blaney drives at COTA.
Alejandro Alvarez | NASCAR Digital Media
Posted on by Staff Report

Tyler Reddick will lead the field to green on Sunday after winning the Busch Light Pole Award at Circuit of The Americas.

Reddick, who won the first two races of the season for 23XI Racing, seeks to become the first driver in NASCAR history to open the Cup Series season with three consecutive wins.

Trackhouse Racing driver and 2022 COTA winner Ross Chastain qualified second and will line up next to Reddick.

See the full lineup below.

The DuraMax Texas Grand Prix Powered by RelaDyne is at 3:30 p.m. ET Sunday (FOX, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

PositionCarDriver
145Tyler Reddick
21Ross Chastain
319Chase Briscoe
412Ryan Blaney
59Chase Elliott
671Michael McDowell
716AJ Allmendinger
820Christopher Bell
954Ty Gibbs
1024William Byron
1138Zane Smith
1277Carson Hocevar
1397Shane van Gisbergen
1417Chris Buescher
155Kyle Larson
1648Alex Bowman
1734Todd Gilliland
1841Cole Custer
1911Denny Hamlin
2022Joey Logano
2110Ty Dillon
2221Josh Berry
237Daniel Suárez
2423Bubba Wallace
2588Connor Zilisch #
266Brad Keselowski
2733Jesse Love(i)
282Austin Cindric
2960Ryan Preece
308Kyle Busch
3142John Hunter Nemechek
3235Riley Herbst
333Austin Dillon
3447Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
354Noah Gragson
3643Erik Jones
3751Cody Ware

# denotes rookie
(i) denotes ineligible for points

Posted on by Reid Spencer

AUSTIN, Texas — Before Shane van Gisbergen and Connor Zilisch arrived on the NASCAR scene and began to assert their superiority on road courses, AJ Allmendinger’s name invariably was the first one mentioned when handicapping circuits with right- and left-hand turns.

But Allmendinger hasn’t won a road-course race since 2023, when he triumphed at Circuit of The Americas in the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series and won at the Charlotte Roval in the Cup Series.

“The way we change that narrative is you go beat them, right?” Allmendinger said. “But for the most part, we didn’t do that at most of the road courses last year. It’s not frustrating to me. For me, the most frustrating thing was just, in general, we didn’t run great at the road courses last year.

RELATED: Cup Series starting lineup | At-track photos

“I put a lot of that on my shoulders. I think as Goodyear softens the tire, it gives the advantage to a guy like SVG (van Gisbergen) that really knows how to save the tires. It’s something that, whether it was setup-based or my own doing, I struggled with it last year of trying to be good on long runs.”

Allmendinger conceded his own performance has to improve if he plans to return to Victory Lane.

“I don’t really put stock in how good SVG is, in that sense. Like for me, it would be different if I ran second every weekend to him on the road courses and you can’t beat him, then that kind of gets frustrating.

“But we weren’t even in that ballpark, so I think it’s more focusing on myself. You try to learn from them; study it, try to figure out what makes them so good and try to go out there and be better. That’s kind of what I focus on. The only thing I get frustrated with is myself.”

On Saturday, however, Allmendinger qualified seventh for Sunday’s DuraMAX Grand Prix Powered by RelaDyne (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio), and van Gisbergen was 13th fastest.

Posted on by Holly Cain

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — In a thrilling final run to the checkered flag, Layne Riggs bobbed and weaved, saving just enough fuel to keep a pair of hard-charging fellow Ford drivers, Ty Majeski and Ben Rhodes, behind him — ultimately earning his first trophy of the season in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series inaugural race on the streets of downtown St. Petersburg.

Riggs’ No. 34 Front Row Motorsports Ford crossed the line a 0.879 seconds ahead of Majeski for the sixth victory of his career in Saturday’s dramatic, high-action OnlyBulls Green Flag 150 at St. Petersburg.

RELATED: Race results | At-track photos 

Starting 28th in the 36-car field, Riggs turned in remarkable work moving forward from the drop of the green flag. He finished seventh in the opening 20-lap stage and won the second stage 20 laps later.

Riggs said the fuel light was flickering with about eight laps to go and that he was almost certain he wasn’t going to have enough to finish, “just didn’t know how long it was going to last.’’

It lasted long enough to take the win and allow for victory donuts around the crowded course as he celebrated the first road course victory of his career, leading a race-best 41 of the 80 laps.

“It was a lot of fun racing here at St. Pete, I think everybody heard street course and thought they weren’t going to be able to pass and there wouldn’t be great side-by-side racing, but this was one of the raciest tracks we’ve ever gone to, at least in the Truck Series in my time,’’ a smiling Riggs said. “It was a lot of fun.

“I call myself a road racer now,’’ he added with a smile, noting this was only his fifth career road-course race of any kind in his life. “It’s amazing to race so many well-known guys, going past some and knowing these guys are road-course ringers and we were faster today.”

Sunny skies and a scenic 1.8-mile 14-turn course along the downtown St. Petersburg waterfront provided a great scene for the series’ first-ever street-course event, and the truckers did not disappoint the large and enthusiastic crowd.

At one point late in the race, Riggs, 23, held a sizable, two-second-plus advantage on the field, but lapped traffic in the final 10 laps allowed Majeski and Rhodes to close in. With a lap to go, it looked like Majeski had put his No. 88 ThorSport Racing Ford in position to make a final challenge on Riggs, but he overshot Turn 13 (for the second time on the day) — recovering enough to hold onto second but still feeling he’d lost an opportunity.

He also climbed out of his Ford truck, similarly encouraged by the venue.

“It was probably the most fun I’ve had in a race car in a long time,’’ said the 2024 series champion Majeski. “A lot of fun. It’s a racey race track with three good passing zones and [it] rewards discipline.

“Just finding that balance between being aggressive and making mistakes and staying disciplined,’’ Majeski said of his day, which included two laps out front and that runner-up finish after starting 22nd. “Just made a little mistake into [Turn] 13, got a little wheel-hop and had to chase it and battle my way back. Hope everyone enjoyed the show. We passed a lot of trucks today.”

Rhodes, who led 23 laps early, similarly could not mount a challenge in the closing laps, having to save fuel himself.

“That’s all we had in the tank for our F-150 here, literally I was running out of gas those last two laps,” said Rhodes, who now has a pair of top-five finishes through the opening three races of the 2026 season. “Really proud of Ford Racing for bringing us a fast truck. Our truck’s in one piece, and a lot of these trucks aren’t. Very excited though. Brand new truck and a good showing for it.”

Former IndyCar stars — Dario Franchitti and James Hinchcliffe, as well as current IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship full-timer Colin Braun — added an extra element of intrigue to the field. Braun, who started 16th in Kaulig Racing’s No. 25 Ram truck, finished ninth – best among that trio.

The former Indy 500 polesitter and multi-race winner Hinchcliffe finished 10th in the No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet, and the three-time Indianapolis 500 winner Franchitti was officially scored 27th, his No. 1 Tricon Garage Toyota pitting late in the race and losing a lap.

MORE: Hear from Hinchcliffe

Fords swept the top four positions, with Riggs’ teammate Chandler Smith finishing fourth after leading seven laps. Tricon’s Kaden Honeycutt rounded out the top five in a Toyota.

Niece Motorsports teammates Landen Lewis and Andrés Pérez were sixth and seventh, with McAnally-Hilgemann Racing’s Daniel Hemric, Braun and Hinch completing the top 10.

“I think the overall headliner is that a Bahamian, North Carolina boy won on a road course against some of the best in the world,” a grinning Riggs said. “It’s a testament to everyone at Front Row Motorsports and a shout-out to [sports car driver] Joey Hand, who did a lot of work with me.”

“It is an amazing place to come and I don’t know why we couldn’t come back next year … I couldn’t believe how packed the grandstands were and I thought it was one of the best road-course races the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series has ever seen,” Riggs said of running the double-header weekend along with the NTT IndyCar Series, which races Sunday. “Thank you to all the fans for coming out.”

Smith now leads the Craftsman Truck Series championship standings by 34 points over the former two-time series champion Rhodes.

The series returns to action March 20 for Buckle Up South Carolina 200 at the historic Darlington Raceway (7:30 p.m. ET, FS1, NRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). The 2025 season champion Corey Heim is the defending winner.

Note: Inspection was completed in the Craftsman Truck Series garage with no issues, confirming Riggs as the winner. 

Posted on by Staff Report

The NASCAR Cup Series and O’Reilly Auto Parts Series return to Circuit of The Americas this weekend, while the Craftsman Truck Series makes its debut on the streets of St. Petersburg, Florida. Bookmark this page and come back often for your race-week essentials — from links to qualifying order, average practice speeds, results and more.

RELATED: COTA, St. Petersburg schedule | TV listings

NASCAR Cup Series

Race day: Sunday at 3:30 p.m. ET on FOX. The categories listed below will be filled out with links as the information is available.

Tires: Seven sets (five new race sets plus one set transferred from qualifying). Teams will also have one set for practice and six sets of wet-weather tires, if needed. 

Entry list
Qualifying order
Practice Results
Practice Lap Averages
Practice Lap Times
Qualifying Results
Pit Stalls
Stage 1 Results
Stage 2 Results
Race Results

NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series

Race day: Saturday at 3 p.m. ET on The CW. The categories listed below will be filled out with links as the information is available.

Tires: Five sets (four new race sets plus one set transferred from qualifying). Teams will also have one set for practice and four sets of wet-weather tires, if needed. 

Entry list
Qualifying order
Practice Results
Practice Lap Averages
Practice Lap Times 
Qualifying Results
Pit Stalls
Stage 1 Results
Stage 2 Results
Race Results

NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series

Race day: Saturday at Noon ET on FOX. The categories listed below will be filled out with links as the information becomes available.

Tires: Five sets (four new race sets plus one set transferred from qualifying). Teams will also have one set for practice and four sets of wet-weather tires, if needed. 

Note: Practice was shortened and qualifying was canceled due to inclement weather. The lineup will be set via the metric.

Entry List
Qualifying Order
Practice Results
Practice Lap Averages
Practice Lap Times
Starting Lineup
Pit Stalls
Stage 1 Results
Stage 2 Results
Race Results

Posted on by Cameron Richardson

AUSTIN, Texas — They say everything is bigger in Texas, and that’s certainly true for the attention Carson Hocevar has received for his assertive racing style.

After ruffling fenders with multiple drivers in the closing laps at Atlanta’s EchoPark Speedway, the No. 77 Spire Motorsports driver kick-started Cup Series media availabilities early Saturday morning at Circuit of The Americas and addressed how his on-track style is drawing comparisons to that of “The Intimidator” Dale Earnhardt.

RELATED: COTA Cup schemes | Key COTA info

“I mean, everybody’s open to their own interpretation,” Hocevar said. “I feel like you’re always just going to be compared to somebody, whether they’re good or bad. You know, if I was really, really slow, there’s probably comparisons of guys that were really, really slow back in the day, too. I just go out and race, and I enjoy it. I take it as a massive compliment, you know, from Richard Petty, Kyle Petty, Dale Jr., all of them making comparisons. I’m appreciative of that. I would like to just have half the success any of those guys did.”

For one to earn comparisons to a 76-win, seven-time Cup Series titleholder, being consistently in contention for victories and running up front needs to be the norm.

That’s been the case for the start of 2026 for Hocevar.

The 23-year-old firecracker been within striking distance of his first career Cup win on the final lap at both Daytona and Atlanta, leading the bell lap in the “Great American Race” before being spun entering Turn 1. The speed has never been a question when discussing Hocevar, but rather his style that’s put him in precarious situations that either take him out of winning contention or take others out.

Hocevar will tell you there is no one driver he is trying to emulate.

“I think if you’re building a perfect race car driver, I think you want to be able to emulate a bit of this guy, a bit of this guy [and] a bit of this guy,” Hocevar said. “You know, you don’t want to just emulate one whole driver. I think you just want to be successful or be versatile in all areas. There’s not, like, a direct style. I just want the style of whatever it takes to succeed, whether it’s being aggressive in this spot or letting somebody else be aggressive for me and taking that spot. It’s just all circumstantial. You’re racing at different corners at different times. You’re playing different people, right? You know, it’s not like any other sport where you’re just playing the same guy over and over and over. You have one restart, and you have totally different guys than you’ve been racing around all day. You’re going to have to be able to change with them.”

In season No. 3 at the Cup level, Hocevar is sensing the narrative change for the entire Spire Motorsports organization as he creates waves up toward the front of the field now.

Going from a one-car team at select events to a borderline powerhouse with three cars in the stable, Hocevar says the rest of the Cup garage is taking note, and the gaps on track are only shrinking as Spire continues to climb the ladder.

“I feel like going into my rookie year, that [77] was 33rd in owners points when I got into it, right?,” Hocevar said. “So, I think from Spire Motorsports’ steps, I think every team that’s not the big three teams that are basically dominating, they’re all trying to emulate Spire’s progression. You saw 23XI [Racing], they’re super successful. Trackhouse Racing is super successful. But now, we’re on that. It’s a lot easier to say it and say you have a five-year plan, but it’s really hard to actually pull it off because when we get faster, the big teams see it, and they want to get faster. So it’s like, did you actually get faster or did everybody else just get faster with you? So if everybody else got faster, did you actually get faster?

“The field just keeps getting tighter. The floors are raising higher than the ceiling right now. We continue to keep adding people, parts and pieces and processes that I think it was known to all of us after the second year that it was expected to have won already, just because I think if we weren’t so fast, people would still think Spire is this little team. But there’s been a lot of times we’ve been in contention, and we’ve changed that narrative ourselves.”

Carson Hocevar races in the No. 77 Chevrolet.
Logan Riely | Getty Images

A Cup Series win is on the horizon for Hocevar, and when that time comes, the comparisons to Earnhardt are only going to grow larger.

They may continue to balloon heading into Sunday’s race at COTA (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) as Hocevar debuts a new Chili’s scheme that emulates the iconic black livery that first earned Earnhardt “The Intimidator” moniker.

MORE: Weekend schedule | Cup Series schedule

For now, Hocevar isn’t fully embracing a 2.0 version, but he won’t shy away from the influence and what his growing influence could be for future generations of drivers.

“I think we’ve been in position to win these races,” Hocevar said. “I don’t know if this week we’ll show that, but I think we have really good tracks coming up that we can do that. But for me, I’m just going in the merch hauler and signing [No.] 77 die casts. You know, that’s me. Maybe in 20-30 years, somebody’s hopefully making comparisons of myself to the next kid that was doing it and running good.

“So, yeah, I just think it was a compliment, but you know, I’m not hanging up No. 3 posters on my wall and trying to pretend to be anything I’m not.”

Posted on by Reid Spencer

AUSTIN, Texas — One of the few things that wasn’t startling about Saturday’s NASCAR Cup Series qualifying session at Circuit of The Americas was Tyler Reddick’s run for the pole position.

Navigating the 2.4-mile road course in 97.760 seconds (88.380 mph) in the second qualifying group, Reddick claimed his third Busch Light Pole Award in six attempts at the track and will lead the field to green in Sunday’s DuraMax Grand Prix Powered by RelaDyne (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

RELATED: Qualifying results | At-track photos

Of course, there’s more at stake for Reddick than simply a victory at COTA. In winning at EchoPark Speedway near Atlanta last Sunday, the driver of the No. 45 Toyota became the sixth Cup competitor to start a season with two consecutive wins. No driver has ever won three straight to open a season.

The 23XI Racing driver acknowledged that the pole position, the 12th of his career, is a positive first step toward that goal.

“It helps the chances, certainly,” said Reddick, whose series-best average finish of 4.6 at COTA includes a victory in 2023. “I think starting up front is huge.”

Michael McDowell led the first qualifying group of 19 drivers with a lap at 88.031 mph, but fell to sixth soon after the second group took to the track. Ultimately, Ross Chastain posted the second-fastest lap at 88.256 mph and will start on the front row beside Reddick.

The shocker was not that Chastain, the 2022 COTA winner, fashioned an excellent lap. What was surprising was that his two Trackhouse Racing teammates, Shane van Gisbergen and Connor Zilisch — both vaunted road-course racers — failed to crack the top 10 in qualifying.

Van Gisbergen was 13th fastest on his third lap. Zilisch could do no better than 25th. Van Gisbergen is seeking his sixth straight road-course victory in the Cup Series, a mark that would tie NASCAR Hall of Famer Jeff Gordon for most consecutive road-course wins.

Chase Briscoe (88.242 mph) will start third, followed by Ryan Blaney (88.179mph) and Chase Elliott (88.161 mph). Elliott leads active drivers with seven road-course victories.

Behind McDowell in sixth, AJ Allmendinger qualified seventh, followed by defending race winner Christopher Bell, Ty Gibbs and William Byron.

“We’ll see how it gets going,” Reddick said. “Certainly, Ross, Shane, Ryan Blaney — there’s a number of good drivers who were really strong in practice today. We’ll try to understand what that all looks like and make our best decisions on the car and everything.”