Posted on by Staff Report

The NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs start on Sept. 4 at Darlington Raceway (6 p.m. ET, USA, NBC Sports App, MRN, SiriusXM). The NASCAR.com editorial team made playoff predictions. Now you can join in on the fun, too.

Cup Series: Full schedule | Point standings | Playoff outlooks

1. Who makes a surprise early exit from playoffs?

STEVE LUVENDER: Ross Chastain’s melon will go bad earlier than most expect. Sure, he’s entering the playoffs ranked third with 20 playoff points under his belt, but the Round of 16’s tracks seems stacked against this year’s surprise breakout driver: Darlington, where he crashed out in May; Kansas Speedway, the site of a top-10 day in the middle of his springtime hot streak; and, of course, Bristol Motor Speedway — the ultimate place for a competitor wronged by Driver No. 1 throughout the course of the season to exact revenge. Combine all this with the fact that he logged a dismal 25.8 average finish in the six races leading up to the playoffs, and it spells trouble.

SEAN MONTGOMERY: William Byron was the first driver to post a crooked number in the win column this season, leaving the No. 24 team as one of the early title favorites. But as the season wore on, Byron and company have struggled tremendously to even crack the top 10. With a host of other teams in form and a strong playoff roster, I have William Byron as one of the first four out. If Byron and Co. cannot mirror their strong spring performance at Darlington, they could be in trouble much sooner than many people think. This isn’t entirely a knock on Byron, there are just much stronger contenders at this point.

CAMERON RICHARDSON: Ross Chastain will be out in the Round of 16. The accumulation of competitor run-ins doesn’t bode well heading into tracks like Darlington, and especially a cutoff race like Bristol. He failed to finish at both tracks earlier this year and it just appears that the momentum the ‘Melon Man’ had early in this season has dissipated at the worst time possible for the two-time winner this season.

2. What postseason race will be most pivotal?

LUVENDER: Playoff contenders will need a flawless Texas Motor Speedway race in the Round of 12. It should be easy enough for above-average teams to skirt through the Round of 16 (though nothing’s guaranteed), but the Round of 12 — Texas, Talladega Superspeedway, and the Charlotte Roval — provides the least amount of comfort thanks mostly to the latter two tracks. A bad pit stop or an untimely incident for an otherwise “safe” driver at Texas could cause a team to sweat the rest of the round.

@NASCARCASM: That would be Texas, which kicks off the Round of 12, and the reason is simple. If you win this race, you’re the only driver to be stress-free heading into Talladega and the Charlotte Motor Speedway road course. Those two races are a gauntlet of chaos and unpredictability — the ‘Upside-Down’ of the NASCAR Playoffs.

ZACH STURNIOLO: As Steve alluded to, the second round provides the biggest opportunity for some chaotic results, particularly thanks to Talladega and the Roval. But the clearer answer to this question in my opinion remains the Roval. The cut from 12 to eight drivers always feels more critical — the definitive line between the contenders and pretenders as far as the championship is concerned. Yes, the Talladega calamity will loom large over the Roval, but how teams respond around the road course will be the pivotal difference.

3. Who will make a surprise deep run into playoffs?

PAT DECOLA: Austin Cindric. I’m seeing a lot of early grids out there that have Cindric out after the Round of 16, but I think he has Round of 12 legs for sure and the potential to stretch it to the Round of 8 (and beyond? 👀). He’s as polished a rookie as we’ve seen in years and apart from a pair of misnomers at Pocono Raceway and Michigan International (two finishes outside the top 30) he has a 7.6 average finish in the other 10 races to close the regular season.

LUVENDER: Internet commenters questioned Austin Dillon’s worthiness of making this year’s playoffs, but he’s poised to contend in the postseason. Allow me to present some stats: an 11th-place average finish in this year’s May visits to Round of 16 tracks. A 2020 Texas race win—the site of the Round of 12 opener. A third-place finish in the Martinsville Speedway spring race, host of the last shot for a driver to make the Championship 4. I’m not necessarily saying the “Austin Dillon’s Life in the Fast Lane” star could contend for the title, but don’t cross out his name in the first round.

RICHARDSON: Christopher Bell. I feel like his season has gone under-appreciated because of the slow start he had to the year. Thirteen top-10 finishes in 21 races dating back to Circuit of The Americas and of those eight races he finished outside the top 10 in that stretch, three of them were wild cards at superspeedways and he also was put in the wall at Michigan. I think Bell will have something to say about the Championship 4 picture.

STURNIOLO: Give me William Byron. The No. 24 team has posted dismal results recently relative to its first eight races of the year, but I’m not ready to write them off yet. His spring run at Darlington should spark some optimism for the bunch, and if he bursts through to the Round of 12, look out for him at the Roval. Byron’s led at least 23 laps in each of the last three races there. All I’m saying is there’s a chance for Willy B. to surprise.

4. Will there be more than seven race winners?

MONTGOMERY: Yes. There will be more than seven race winners in the final 10-race stretch, including a non-playoff driver (not qualified or remaining) at Phoenix Raceway. Consistency has been hard to come by for many teams this season, and with another road course and Talladega looming large, my odds favor the over.

GEORGE WINKLER: I tend to agree with Sean here that there will be more than seven race winners. Everything about this season has taught me to expect the unexpected. First of all, who thought there’d be 16 winners this season when we started way back in February? Plus, there doesn’t seem to be one driver like last year with Kyle Larson who is a clear favorite and who is capable of running off multiple wins in a row.

ZACK ALBERT: Seven is a great number for an over/under on playoff winners, but not certain that we get there. The cream typically rises when the postseason arrives, and even though this season has been the picture of parity, let’s still leave the door open for someone to get hot and go on the type of run that Kyle Larson went on last year — a 5-of-10 tear. There’s doubt that we get that level of postseason dominance, but two or three repeaters would chop the window for seven winners.

5. Most points for Hendrick in Round of 16?

STURNIOLO: I’ll stick with the boring answer of Chase Elliott here. As mentioned earlier, I think William Byron might surprise with a first-round victory to advance, but Elliott enters the round with a 15-point advantage over second-place Joey Logano. None of the three tracks in this opening round — Darlington, Kansas, Bristol — are bad tracks for Elliott, who had led significant laps at each and won at Kansas in 2018. Kyle Larson will give him a run for his money, but I’ll stick with the Regular Season Champion.

ALBERT: Going with the chalk is a wise move, especially with how remarkably consistent Chase Elliott has been. But the three tracks in the Round of 16 line up favorably for Larson. The defending champ was an early exit in the tour’s previous visit to Darlington, but led laps before his engine expired. At Kansas, he pressed eventual winner Kurt Busch down the stretch before settling for second, and Bristol — the round finale — has typically been a welcome sight on Larson’s schedule. He won the track’s annual night race last year.

6. First Ford driver to win a playoff race?

DECOLA: Kevin Harvick. This might be a bit of a surprise given how fast Ryan Blaney’s No. 12 has been and the fact that Joey Logano is entering the playoffs second in points, but Harvick is just too good at Darlington to pass up, and I think he opens the postseason with a win. Something has clicked with that No. 4 team over the past month and I feel like Harvick and Co. are still being slept on.

LUVENDER: I’ll bet at least one of my sagacious teammates will say Kevin Harvick—after all, he made everybody else look downright slow in the month of August, and he’s awfully stout at many of the playoff tracks, particularly the first-round race at Darlington where he’s riding a streak of 13-straight top 10s—but that’s too easy. Being the contrarian I am, I’ll say Chase Briscoe will hoist Ford’s first postseason trophy. “But, Steve, he’s only scored one top 10 in the regular season since April,” you might say. That’s true, reader, but if we’ve learned anything in 2022, it’s that nothing is predictable; my choice is Briscoe because he’s been quiet all summer.

7. Dillon vs. Reddick: Who is eliminated first?

WINKLER: Dillon has the late momentum with his win at Daytona getting him into the playoffs, but for the bulk of the season Reddick has performed slightly better. Reddick has more wins (two), top 10s (11 to 8) and laps led (331 to 18) than Dillon. Interestingly, they both have the same average finish (16.7). Reddick might have more versatility, too, since he’s more of a threat to get a win on a road course. Plus, he had top-10 finishes at Darlington, Bristol, Las Vegas Motor Speedway and Phoenix in the Next Gen car this year, and all of those tracks are on the playoff menu again.

ALBERT: Here’s also tipping the cap to Dillon’s recent momentum, while also acknowledging that Darlington has shaped up as one of his better venues in recent years. Still, Reddick’s overall performance at a wider swath of tracks gives the No. 8 driver the edge over the longer playoff haul.

8. Who wins another Cup Series championship?

@NASCARCASM: It’s hard to pick against Chase Elliott at this point. He’s been the dominant car in pretty much every category — points, laps led, average finish, etc. He even finished third at Pocono Raceway and still somehow won the race. That takes skill and talent.

MONTGOMERY: The answer is Kyle Busch. As if he needed any more motivation. The two-time Cup Series champion will be more focused than ever to get his third premier series title, especially with the uncertainty surrounding his 2023 future and beyond. Busch and the No. 18 team have had an incredibly unfortunate run of luck lately, so I’m betting on that coming to a halt. When he gets to Phoenix, it will be hard to bet against the three-time track winner. He’s finished outside the top seven just twice since 2015.

9. Team with most drivers in the Championship 4?

RICHARDSON: Joe Gibbs Racing will be the team to shine heading into the Championship 4 and going back to the surprise deep run, Bell will be one of the four going for the Cup Series championship at Phoenix in November and he’ll have Kyle Busch alongside him. Given his roller coaster of a season, it’s hard to see Kyle Larson getting back to the title race, especially with how the Round of 12 could play out. I think there will be one Penske and one Hendrick driver to join Busch and Bell in the battle for the championship.

ALBERT: As difficult to forecast as this season has been, this is almost a trick question since the likelihood of four drivers — all from different teams — in the championship round seems especially high. However, if forced to pick one organization with multiple drivers, the leaning points to a Hendrick Motorsports duo — Chase Elliott plus Kyle Larson — making the final cut. (Honorable mention: The very real possibility of a Team Penske double-up with Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney)

10. Does Hamlin win his first Cup Series title?

WINKLER: It’s hard to pick one driver to buy into this year as a true favorite, and that more than anything is why I’m voting no as far as Hamlin winning his first title. He’s definitely talented enough to go the distance with 48 Cup wins to his credit, and he is capable of winning on any of the tracks in the playoffs. But when comparing Hamlin against himself, this hasn’t been his most consistent season to date. His five top-five finishes are his lowest total since he had four in 2013 in a season when he missed four starts. And his seven top-10 finishes are his lowest output since eight in that same season.

STURNIOLO: In a season of unpredictability, I’ll give Denny Hamlin the nod to finally score his first Cup championship. Ford opened the season dominant on the Phoenix tire compound, evidenced by Chase Briscoe’s Phoenix win in March and Joey Logano’s Gateway victory in June. But Toyota hasn’t been far off. Hamlin scored a Richmond win in the spring and his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Martin Truex Jr. dominated the day at New Hampshire Motor Speedway before Christopher Bell — another JGR teammate — took the victory. So give me the No. 11 Toyota to raise the Bill France Cup in November.

Posted on by Cara Cooper

Tim DeVos isn’t quite sure how long he’s been racing. He believes he started sometime around 1978, when he was around 18 years old.

He’s also not quite sure how many championships he’s won. There was one super stock title in the 1990s, and a couple other outlaw late model titles sprinkled in there.

There is one number of which he’s sure: 101. It’s the number of wins he has at Berlin Raceway.

That number is big in his mind, because it’s just two away from the all-time wins record at the NASCAR-sanctioned, 7/16-mile paved oval in Marne, Michigan.

There’s one other thing of which he’s sure.

“We’ll get it,” DeVos said of the record. “Unless something catastrophic happens in the meantime, we’re still plugging along, still winning races at a pretty good rate.”

RELATED: Watch all the action at Berlin live on FloRacing

Llm 12 1f3a7070
(Photo: Ally Ross/Berlin Raceway)

DeVos has eight wins this season in Berlin’s Limited Late Model division. With three races left this season, he has a chance to tie, or even break, that record this year.

“It’d be pretty cool. It’d be nice to do that,” DeVos said. “Especially because when you first start out racing, you always dream of winning that first race, hoping you can possibly win a race someday, and then you finally get the first one. I don’t even remember the first win.

“And then you get another one and another one and pretty soon…” he adds, his voice trailing off at the thought. “It never gets old, though. Winning races never gets old. It always makes your weekend better if you won on Saturday.”

DeVos grew up about three miles from Berlin Raceway, and he could hear the cars racing on Saturday nights, always thinking it would be cool to build a race car and try it.

Unlike other drivers whose dads or uncles or family members showed them the ropes, nobody in DeVos’ family had ever raced before. His experience came from a guy he was working for at the time, who told him he would give a $3 an hour raise to help him build a race car “instead of beating the crap out of the company truck,” Devos said.

“So I did, and he gave me the raise,” he added. “I learned from him what little bit I could. I’d go to the track with him. He’d pay me to go to the track with him on Saturdays sometimes just to help out if he didn’t have a pit crew on a particular Saturday. So I’d get paid to go to the race track on Saturday, which was pretty cool.”

DeVos started racing not long after, but it took him a year or two to get a win.

“We went in pretty green,” he said.

A lot has changed in racing since DeVos began as a teenager, but he still does everything the same. He works on the car himself with friends Dave Avink and Richie Dygraph.

He’s also the same driver he’s always been.

“Just go, go, go,” he said. “I’m up on the wheel and drive the crap out of it the whole race.”

In four decades, DeVos has raced in just about every series at Berlin except the Modifieds. He’s racked up wins but hasn’t won as many titles. He came into each season and each race just trying to win as much as possible.

“I would start late in the season,” he said. “I ran Sportsman for a number of years and I would start, like, three weeks into the season, and I would still just about win the championship. Like, dang, I should have started on time.”

DeVos is currently fourth in Berlin’s Limited Late Model standings, and second in the NASCAR Advance Auto Parts Division II national standings, six points out of first.

“We’re having an excellent season this year,” he said. “It’s going pretty good. The car is fast. We’re winning a lot of races and finishing good in the ones we don’t win.”

DeVos has raced at many other tracks in his career, but Berlin will always be his home. It’s the type of track where if you can figure it out and get good, you can win anywhere.

And if there’s anyone who has gotten good at Berlin, it’s DeVos. He has 101 victories there to prove it, and three more chances to get a few more this season.

“I want to win them. I’m hoping,” he said of the rest of the season. “Or at least trying to. We’re going to give it our best shot. It’s going to be awful difficult to win three in a row, but we’ll give it a whirl and see what happens.”

NASCAR racing will return to Berlin this Saturday with Super Late Models, Limited Late Models, 4-Cylinders and Mini Wedges. All of the action can be seen live on FloRacing starting at 6:30 p.m. ET.

Posted on by Reid Spencer

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Kyle Busch acknowledged on Thursday that he has more than one contract offer on the table but making a decision about his future as a driver has complicated his life as the NASCAR Cup Series Playoff approaches.

“I was hoping yesterday,” Busch said when asked when he might have a deal to announce. “I’m not going to put a timeline on it, but time is a-ticking, and there are a lot of other options and a lot of other dominoes that need to fall.”

RELATED: Darlington weekend schedule | Meet the playoff field

An elite driver with 60 Cup victories and two series titles to his credit, Busch clearly has options.

“More than one that has paper in front of me,” he acknowledged.

But the process has been anything but comfortable.

“Trust me, my gut doesn’t feel good, and that’s not just for decisions being made, but more so of decisions being weighed and the perception in how you come across to all of those that you’re going to disappoint. Right?

“There’s going to be one winner, and the rest are not winners, if you look at it in that regard. Good for me, but I definitely don’t want to come across as a lead-on or a liar or anything like that, so that’s why it’s been touch and go, and tread lightly.”

Busch described his decision-making process as one of the toughest periods of his life, but he doesn’t think the stress of the negotiations will prevent him from winning a third championship with his current No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing team.

“It weighs on you every day of the week,” Busch said. “I think the best thing that I have for me is experience in being able to go race on Sunday. I’m a racer. That’s all I know. So, when I get to the race track every weekend, I put my helmet on, and that’s what I focus on.

“Being by myself, I do my best work inside that car, so I don’t have to think about anything besides making that car go fast.”

Posted on by Zack Albert

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — As wide-open as the first 26 races of the NASCAR Cup Series season have been, the logic follows that identifying a favorite for the championship isn’t a clear-cut task. Ask that of regular-season champ Chase Elliott, the top seed and the series’ leader in wins this year, and he won’t budge.

“I mean, there’s just there’s been too many people good at different times, right?” said Elliott, the 2020 champion. “Like, just because we have a win more than other people, doesn’t mean other people aren’t capable of winning or having a really good day, too. So you know, you want to … you have to respect the whole field, in my opinion. There’s a lot of really talented drivers, a lot of really smart people working with these teams.”

The topic was front and center in Thursday’s NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs Media Day in the Charlotte Convention Center, where the 16 drivers bidding for the championship held court. The quest for that title opens this weekend down the road at Darlington Raceway, where Sunday’s Cook Out Southern 500 (6 p.m. ET, USA, NBC Sports App, MRN, SiriusXM) kicks off the 10-race postseason stretch.

RELATED: Darlington weekend schedule | Meet the playoff field

The season to date has been marked by parity, with 15 winners eligible for the playoffs. A 16th winner, Kurt Busch, withdrew his name from consideration as he remains sidelined while recovering from a head injury.

Still, Elliott has some breathing room at the top of the heap. His four wins are two more than any other driver in the series this year, and his consistency — marked by 17 top-10 finishes — is also unmatched. Playoff qualifiers Ross Chastain and Christopher Bell have the next-most with 14. Elliott’s performance clinched the Regular-Season Championship one race early and secured a 15-point bonus for his playoff tally.

“I mean, you can’t ignore the teams that have been really consistent all year,” said Richard Childress Racing’s Tyler Reddick, a two-time winner this year and the playoffs’ eighth seed. “Obviously, I think the obvious one that has capitalized the most and been most consistent, he’s won the most races and he’s gathered the most points is Chase Elliott. So you know, I’d say they’ve been doing their part very well, but I mean, it’s only got them a 40-, 35-point cushion. I mean, in years past we’ve seen drivers accumulate way more than that. So it gives you something, but you know, it just feels like it’s been closer than it ever has. Things change so fast, race to race, especially with three races in each round.”

The same sentiment goes for defending champion Kyle Larson, a teammate to Elliott at Hendrick Motorsports. Larson set the bar as a front-runner last year, entering the playoffs as the top seed with a 28-point gap on his nearest competitors. Elliott’s points gap this season over second-place Joey Logano sits at 15, and the full range from first to last is just 40 points.

MORE: Cup Series standings

“I definitely can’t put my finger on one particular favorite,” Larson said.  “I think you can look at Chase as probably the favorite if you had to pick one, just because you know he’s won the most, he won the regular season title and all that, and his team’s done a really good job executing. But man, it’s hard to expect anything out of each week that we’ve had already.”

“Points are really tight, so there’s no real clear runaway,” said Kyle Busch, who slots as the 11th seed, but sits just four points out of fifth in a crowded middle of the playoff pack. “Chase’s got a bit of a lead. But, you know, the rest of us, it’s all pretty close, especially fourth-on-back. So I would like to think that this year is just going to be a bit different for a lot of reasons. And I think the car is obviously a huge piece of that with just the the parity.”

Owe some of that to the Next Gen car that debuted in the NASCAR Cup Series this year. The layer of uncertainty that the new model has introduced continues into the playoffs, even with return trips planned for several tracks on the schedule ahead.

Drivers anticipate the same trend starting this weekend at Darlington, where Joey Logano prevailed in a late duel with William Byron back in May.

“With this car? I mean, if you tell me who’s gonna win Darlington, and you get it right, I’ll give you 1,000 bucks,” said Trackhouse’s Daniel Suárez, in his first playoff go-around. “I don’t think you’re gonna get it right. There is no one guy. You know, anyone can be good. So I love that about this car, that it’s unpredictable. Everyone has this opportunity.”

Posted on by Zach Sturniolo

After 26 races, the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs are officially here.

The postseason kicks off with the Cook Out Southern 500 on Sunday at Darlington Raceway (6 p.m. ET, USA, NBC Sports App, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). The event starts the Round of 16, which consists of three races before the first elimination from championship contention.

Prepare for the playoff opener with all the info you need here:

RELATED: Weekend schedule | Cup Series standings

TAMING THE TRACK TOO TOUGH TO TAME

Teams will have limited time to dial their cars in for a grueling 500 miles around the 1.366-mile Darlington Raceway. Competitors will have roughly 20 minutes to practice on Saturday (12:05 p.m. ET, NBC Sports App, 12:30 p.m. USA Network) with teams broken into Groups A and B. After each group practices, single-car, single-lap qualifying will begin to set the starting lineup (12:50 p.m. ET).

With the postseason set to begin, playoff drivers and teams will be ordered by their previous race metrics and assigned to Group A or B by the usual odd/even metric procedures. Playoff teams will be the final cars to qualify in their respective groups.

The five fastest overall drivers from each group will advance to the final round of qualifying, where those 10 drivers will each set one more timed lap to fight for the Busch Light Pole Award.

MORE: Paint Scheme Preview | Qualifying order

DARLINGTON STORY LINES

— Sixteen different drivers won through 26 races, tied for the record through 26 races set in 1961 and 2003.

— Denny Hamlin’s average finish of 7.75 at Darlington is his best on an oval and his best of all tracks with more than two starts.

— The eventual race winner at Darlington scored stage points in each stage in every race.

— The pass for the win came in the final 10 laps in 15 of the 26 races in 2022.

— Twelve of the last 14 Darlington winners all had at least 24 career wins entering the race.

— Sixty-three percent of the races at Darlington were won by drivers who won a Cup Series championship.

— Hendrick Motorsports’ last of a Cup-record 14 Darlington wins was in May 2012 when Jimmie Johnson got the team it’s 200th Cup win. (Hendrick was runner-up both races there last year.)

— Four of the last 11 races at Darlington were won from pit stall 35; two of the last eight were won from stall 10 and only three of the last 13 were won from stall 1.

Source: Racing Insights

GOODYEAR TIRES

Darlington Raceway is known for devouring tires with its rough, abrasive surface and narrow racing groove. Teams will have 13 sets available to use throughout the course of the event, meaning they’ll have one set available per every 28.2 laps.

“This race is one of the biggest challenges for both teams and tires on the whole schedule,” Greg Stucker, Goodyear’s director of racing, said in a release. “Running 500 miles on such a narrow track is tough, but then teams have to deal with the abrasive track surface that wears tires like none other. We expect to see more than two seconds of fall-off a lap over the course of a fuel run, so drivers who manage their tires will benefit on long runs. With 13 sets for the race, pit road will be a very busy and important place as teams take four tires every chance they get.”

DARLINGTON HISTORY

— Darlington, also known as “The Track Too Tough to Tame” and “The Lady in Black,” is NASCAR’s oldest superspeedway.

— The track’s first race was on Sept. 4, 1950, the 21st race in Cup Series history and 13th of the 1950 season.

— Darlington has hosted a NASCAR Cup Series race every year since.

— Darlington native Harold Brasington quit racing in the late 1940s to concentrate on peanut farming and his construction business. He got the idea for a speedway after he noticed the huge crowds at the Indianapolis 500. In 1949 he leased cotton and peanut farmland on the west side of town from his poker playing buddy Sherman Ramsey. He created an egg-shaped oval with one corner tighter, narrower, and more steeply banked because he promised Ramsey that the new track wouldn’t disturb his minnow pond at the west end.

— The first NASCAR race held on an oval track more than 1-mile long and the first on a paved track took place on the 1.25 mile speedway before 25,000 fans on Sept. 4, 1950. Qualifying for the first race was held ‘Indianapolis style’ over 15 days from Aug. 19th-Sept. 2nd. The five fastest cars each day qualified for the race. Curtis Turner was the fastest on the first day and won the pole. The fastest qualifier was Wally Campbell. Many competitors drove their race cars to the track.

—  Seventy-five drivers started three-abreast in the first ever 500-mile stock car race which lasted six hours and 38 minutes. Crews underestimated how many tires the gritty surface would chew up and went through the infield buying spare tires from fans.

— The inaugural 500-miler was won by Indianapolis 500 driver Johnny Mantz, the slowest qualifier of the field, who chose much harder Indy-style tires. Mantz won $10,100 from the $25,000 purse. His average speed of 73 mph was faster than his qualifying speed.

— The last four Darlington races were won by different drivers.

— Erik Jones in 2019 is the only Darlington winner under the age of 30 in the last 14 races.

— Joey Logano passed William Byron with two laps to go at Darlington in May, the latest the pass for the win was made in the last 20 Darlington races.

Source: Racing Insights

LUCK BE THE LADY IN BLACK SUNDAY NIGHT

Kyle Larson is still searching for his first win at Darlington Raceway, but he enters the Southern 500 as the odds-on favorite at 6-1, according to BetMGM.

Larson hounded Denny Hamlin in the closing quarter lap in last year’s race but wound up finishing P2. In fact, Larson has finished second or third in five of his last seven Darlington starts. Perhaps this is the year he breaks through.

The obvious steal of the week, however, is Kevin Harvick. Harvick is a two-time Southern 500 champion and three-time winner at Darlington overall. The 2014 winner of the Cup title enters listed at 20-1 odds but holds a streak of 13 straight top-nine finishes.

MORE: Complete list of odds for Sunday

FANTASY LIVE

Want to manage a team and race your way to the top of the leaderboards? Check out NASCAR Fantasy Live, which resets for the playoffs. The free-to-play game lets you choose your drivers each week and show off your crew-chief instincts by garaging a driver by the end of Stage 2, and there is a $10,000 prize for the playoff winner.

The 2022 Fantasy Live points leaders are Chase Elliott (933), Joey Logano (802), Martin Truex Jr. (793) and Ryan Blaney (793).

In addition to Fantasy Live, NASCAR.com is offering the Playoffs Grid Challenge presented by Ruoff Mortgage during the playoffs.

How to play: Fantasy Live | Set up a team today!

ALSO ON NASCAR.COM

Get additional camera views by logging on to NASCAR Drive, where each week a select number of in-car cameras will be available — as well as a battle cam and an overhead look.

NASCAR has partnered with LiveLike to add fan engagement in the NASCAR Mobile App. Log in to the mobile app during the race for polls, quizzes, the cheer meter and more — and see instant results from NASCAR fans like you.

 

Posted on by Staff Report

Denny Hamlin is the only active NASCAR Cup Series driver with four career wins at Darlington Raceway.

He’s the only active driver with an average finish better than eighth (7.8) and ranks second in top-five finish rate (55%) and top-10 finish rate (75%).

That’s not enough to be the favorite this weekend.

As of Thursday, Hamlin was +700 in race-winner odds at the BetMGM online sportsbook for the Cook Out Southern 500, just behind Kyle Larson (+600) and just ahead of a quartet of drivers at +800.

It’s a similar position for Hamlin; he was +700 to win the Goodyear 400 in May at Darlington, tied with Martin Truex Jr. and just behind Larson (+500).

However, Hamlin is a more popular pick this weekend than in May. He had approximately 4% of the race-winner handle for the Goodyear 400, but now has more than 12% of the handle for the Cook Out Southern 500.

Hamlin was frustrated upon his arrival at the Goodyear 400; he had four straight finishes outside the top 15 and just one top 10 – a win in the Toyota Owners 400 – in the season’s first 11 races. The 48-time winner on the NASCAR Cup Series likened the issues to a “coyote [that] gets the anvil dropped on its head,” while conceding the frustration has simplified his team’s strategy.

“We go for playoff points only,” Hamlin said. “So when you see the field start splitting because they want stage points or whatever, you know where the 11 stands from this point on. We’re trying to get five points at the end of the race and two for the playoffs during stages.”

Hamlin finished 21st in the Goodyear 400 but earned 27 points, which proved pivotal en route to his 16th career playoff appearance. His 15th appearance began with a win; exactly one year ago, he snapped a 31-race winless drought by winning the 2021 Cook Out Southern 500.

If Hamlin goes on to defend his win at “The Lady in Black,” he must, at minimum, finish ahead of Chase Elliott, whom he faces in a blockbuster featured matchup in NASCAR betting:

Denny Hamlin (-120) vs. Chase Elliott (-110)

Denny Hamlin has more wins at Darlington than Chase Elliott has top-five finishes (three). And Elliott has finished 20th or worse more times in his last five starts (three) at the track than Hamlin has in 20 career starts (two).

However, Elliott is the regular-season points champion with a Cup Series-high four wins and has been a popular pick among bettors all season. And he’s a popular pick this weekend, again; his race-winner ticket share (7.2%) ranks second to only Kevin Harvick (11.1%), and handle share (8.5%) ranks fourth.

Elliott is also dominating featured matchup betting over Hamlin; he has 96% of the handle on 75% of the tickets.

Austin Dillon (-130) vs. Austin Cindric (+100)

After sneaking into the playoffs, Austin Dillon returns to a track where he’s never won and never led a lap in 12 starts but ranks fifth among active drivers in average finish (11.9). And among drivers with at least 10 starts at the track, he’s only behind Chris Buescher and Landon Cassill in start-to-finish improvement (+3.8).

The public isn’t buying Dillon to win – he’s tied for the 16th-highest ticket share (2.5%) and 22nd-highest handle share (1%) – or to finish ahead of Austin Cindric. Dillon has just 7% of the tickets and 5% of the handle in the featured matchup.

Kyle Larson (-140) vs. Kyle Busch (+110)

Kyle Larson is the betting favorite – one year removed from a five-start stretch at Darlington with four top-three finishes – but Kyle Busch is the veteran. This will be his 22nd start at the track, second to only Kevin Harvick (30) among drivers in the field this weekend.

Larson and Busch have a 50-50 ticket split in featured matchup betting, but Larson’s 50% equates to 88% of the handle.

Tyler Reddick (-155) vs. Kevin Harvick (+120)

Tyler Reddick finished second at the Goodyear 400, his first top five in six career Cup Series starts at the track – though he did have third and second-place finishes in the Xfinity Series in 2018 and 2019, respectively.

His Southern 500 featured matchup opponent Kevin Harvick leads in both race-winner ticket share and handle share (17.7%), and has 71% of the handle (on 77% of the tickets) in the matchup.

You can view updated Cook Out Southern 500 odds and more online sports betting, including parlays and live betting, at BetMGM.

Posted on by Cameron Richardson

When you look at Darlington Raceway from afar, it may appear to be like other ovals on the NASCAR circuit that are longer than a mile. That impression couldn’t be further from the truth. What other track has a nickname as slick as “The Lady in Black” or has history written on its walls whenever a car brushes off it, leaving the classic ‘Darlington stripe’ to add a bit of flair to even the most iconic paint schemes?

Darlington opens the Cup Series Playoffs for the third consecutive year Sunday (6 p.m. ET, USA Network, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) and it’s one of the greatest — if not the greatest — challenge for drivers to see if they have the mettle to be a champion in NASCAR’s premier series.

RELATED: Playoff standings | Top Darlington moments

Due to its unique egg-like shape, the 1.366-mile track plays out differently in almost every corner and every lap. Turns 1 and 2 are deceptively steep at 25 degrees of banking and force the drivers to make a tough decision to either run a low second lane, where they could be slower coming off Turn 2, or run the preferred line right next to the wall where the slightest of mistakes could send your car into the wall. Turns 3 and 4 become a fight for space in the narrow corners, and if drivers don’t set up their exits perfectly, well, expect the wall to leave a gift on the side of their cars.

Driving to the limit at Darlington is the key to winning at this historic track. And sometimes, it ends up playing out like a short track in crunch time as we’ve seen over the years.

Whether it be two title contenders putting each other in the wall late in the 2020 edition of the Southern 500 or one of NASCAR’s greatest finishes of all tine in 2003, where Kurt Busch and Ricky Craven slammed door-to-door all the way down the frontstretch in a duel for the ages, Darlington has a flair for the dramatic and fans should expect nothing less for Sunday’s Labor Day weekend tradition.

 

The track “Too Tough to Tame” certainly lived up to the moniker in the spring as one-third of the field ended up behind the wall with severe damage or a mechanical problem before Joey Logano took the checkered flag. If you go back to last year’s running of the Southern 500, the playoffs were flipped upside down in its first chapter of 2021 as nine of the 16 playoff drivers finished outside the top 15.

While many have yet to conquer Darlington, there are a few drivers who have becomes favorites of “The Lady in Black.”

Defending Southern 500 winner Denny Hamlin tops that list as he’s won three of the last 10 races on the 1.366-mile oval. Two-time 2022 winner Kevin Harvick is riding a wave of momentum entering the postseason and has seemingly developed a mutual bond with Darlington as he has a ludicrous average finish of 3.9 in the last 10 races at the track. Matter of fact, you have to go back to over a decade ago the last time the 2014 Cup champion finished outside the top 10 on the oval.

RELATED: Spring race recap

Logano is the most recent winner on the egg-shaped oval and tamed the track by ruffling some feathers as he gave the classic bump-and-run to William Byron entering Turn 3 with two laps to go.

Intense drama, pinpoint precision and patience pushed to the limit are always factors when trying to complete 500 miles around Darlington but even if drivers try to do everything right, only “The Lady In Black” gets to choose who she wants to court to Victory Lane on Sunday.

Best Average Finish at Darlington All-time (more than two starts):

Driver Avg. Finish Starts
Denny Hamlin 7.75 20
Kyle Larson 8.89 9
Bill Elliott 9.37 52
Herb Thomas 10.43 7
Nelson Stacy 10.5 6

Source: Racing Insights


Posted on by Staff Report

The wait is over.

USA Network’s new unscripted series “Race for the Championship” premieres tonight at 10 p.m. ET, and the first of 10 episodes provides exclusive looks and sounds with multiple NASCAR Cup Series champions as they prepare for the 2022 season.

RELATED: Busch: Series humanizes us | Drivers praise series

Each episode throughout the series will feature multiple drivers and their lives and stories away from the track. Joey Logano, Kyle Larson and Daniel Suárez will be the three spotlighted tonight.

In tonight’s episode, you can also expect to see:

• Mic’d up sound from Chase Elliott, Larson and Ryan Blaney from a Next Gen test at Phoenix Raceway before the start of the 2022 season;

• Larson sitting down with Hendrick Motorsports executive and NASCAR Hall of Famer Jeff Gordon to discuss the upcoming season … and Larson’s fandom as a child;

• The difficult decision with which Joey Logano and wife Brittany wrestle, as Brittany is nearing the birth of their third child during the week of the Busch Light Clash;

• A never-before-seen look and analysis of  the inaugural Busch Light Clash at the Coliseum in Los Angeles.

—

How to find USA Network | USA Network streaming on the go

Posted on by Sponsored Content

The F-150 Lightning is the smartest, most connected F-150 ever.

During the NASCAR Playoffs, Ford and NASCAR are giving fans an inside look at the jaw-dropping features of the 2023 Ford F-150® Lightning™ Lariat that’ll have them saying “What the Frunk?!” — as they get a chance to win one for themselves.

Fans can enter daily for a chance to win a 2023 F-150® Lightning Lariat. And once their entry is complete, the excitement keeps on rollin’ with opportunities to win instant prizes including Ford NASCAR Cup Series Driver diecasts and tickets to 2023 NASCAR Cup Series races.

ENTER THE CONTEST

To dial up the excitement even more, for a limited time, Ford and NASCAR are also bringing fans a chance to win a VIP racing experience in 2023. Fans who enter the promo before Sept. 17 will get a chance to win this bonus, racing experience.

All told, the experience puts the spotlight on what makes the electric Ford F-150® Lightning™ Lariat and gives fans a chance to grab a piece of the action.

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. Ends 11/6/22. Must be a permanent legal resident of the (50) U.S. or DC of legal age of majority (& at least 18 years of age) as of 8/29/22. Void where prohibited. For rules, entry, and complete details click here. The depiction of the Prize Vehicle in any advertising or promotional materials may not reflect the actual design and features of the actual Prize Vehicle delivered to the Vehicle Prize Winner. All vehicle prize details are at the sole discretion of Ford. Instant Win Prize images are for illustrative purposes only. Actual prizes may vary. NASCAR, LLC, NASCAR Digital Media, LLC, & Ford Motor Company are not Sponsors of this Promotion. NASCAR® & NASCAR Cup Series™ are trademarks of the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC. Ford Motor Company & Ford F-150® LightningTM are trademarks of Ford Motor Company.

Posted on by Reid Spencer

In the debut season of NASCAR’s Next Gen Cup Series car, drivers have noted that certain crash impacts have been particularly jarring.

“I feel like my jaw was like one of those boxers that gets his whole face demolished,” said Denny Hamlin, one of the victims of a 13-car wreck last Sunday at Daytona International Speedway.

Rear impacts with the Next Gen car are the primary concern, and NASCAR is looking at a variety of solutions to ameliorate the issue.

MORE NEXT GEN: Explore 3D model

Officials from the sanctioning body met with Cup drivers and teams throughout the design and development process for the Next Gen car. Crash tests were conducted first with simulations and then with physical tests involving parts of cars, half-cars and eventually full vehicles.

“When we discussed it with the drivers and the teams, we essentially said that in right-frontal impacts and right-lateral impacts, right-side impacts and left-side impacts, we expected the experience to be approximately the same as they’ve had in the past (with the Gen 6 car),” said John Patalak, managing director, safety engineering at NASCAR.

“In frontal impacts, the Next Gen [data] shows to perform a little better… In rear impacts, we didn’t have as much space available to us as we did in Gen-6 for crush. We wanted to be sure we were not going to have fires or fuel cell damage during rear impacts. So we were a little bit limited, and we talked to drivers about that in 2021, and also the teams.”

NASCAR maintains a crash database dating to 2011 and has started accumulating data from Next Gen crashes this season. The two most useful statistics involve change in velocity (known as Delta-v, which is not vehicle dependent and also considers the angle of the crash) and peak acceleration (which involves the g-forces at impact).

“Those two things have shown to be good predictors of driver injury risk,” Patalak said. “We’ve correlated those statistically with research from a few years ago, and we continue to look at that and track that, because they’re important to us and because they are good predictors.

“A lot of drivers have said at different times, ‘Hey, that felt like the hardest hit I’ve ever had. What’s going on? That was huge,’” Patalak said. “When we look at the speed and angle into the wall of some of those crashes, which are two things which dictate crash severity, we have indeed seen some big hits this season, and that would be the case regardless of the type of race car.”

The handling behavior of the car is a contributing factor. The impacts from overcorrecting or from breaking loose on corner exit approaching the outside wall tend to be more severe, Patalak said.

“From that perspective, I think the data from the car is matching the driver’s perception of the crash,” he added.

Then again, there are crashes that are less severe than a driver might have anticipated.

“For me, I’ve only crashed the Next Gen car, truthfully, twice where I feel like it was a hard wreck, and they were both at superspeedways,” said Stewart-Haas Racing driver Chase Briscoe. “Both of them were way better than I thought they were going be. The Talladega wreck, for sure, I thought was going to be way worse from a ‘feel’ standpoint, and I felt fine.

“I was sore the next day or two, but I feel like that was kind of typical.  Obviously, I think there’s still stuff we can do to make it better, but I think in the old car there was still stuff we could do to make it better. So I think that’s the hard thing right now with the Next Gen car is, with the old car, we literally probably had thousands of data points that we could look at in crashes, where right now we’re not even probably in the hundreds yet.

“So it’s just hard to kind of pinpoint what we need to do better on this car, and as it runs and as we get through the years, I’m sure we’re going to continue to make progress on it and make it better. But I think it’s always a moving target. You’re never gonna be perfectly safe; I don’t think. You’re a race car driver. You’re driving nearly 200 miles an hour, and anything can happen, but the safer we can make it, the better.”

Right now, the primary target is lessening the severity of the rear impacts. The possible solutions aren’t limited to the structure of the car. Enhancing head-surround foam is another potential safety improvement.

“Can we make that better with newer and different materials, as well as optimizing the current materials?” Patalak said.

All potential improvements are data-driven and fed by simulations.

“We are looking at ways to be creative in creating more deflection for rear impacts,” Patalak said. “It would involve all those parts and pieces—the rear clip, the rear crash structure, the rear bumper, the rear bumper foam. That whole area from behind the driver’s seat has to work as a complete assembly during a crash.”