Consistency is king for those who want to win a NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour championship.
That isn’t just a statement; that’s a fact proven by countless champions throughout the 40-year history of the series dating back to 1985.
It was proven again last year by Austin Beers, who won two races and finished no worse than ninth throughout the 16-race season on his way to becoming the youngest champion in series history.
Entering Sunday’s Thunder in the Mountains 200 at White Mountain Motorsports Park (3 p.m. ET on FloRacing), consistency is proving, yet again, to be the most important factor in the battle for the Modified Tour championship.
Through eight of 16 races, Patrick Emerling and the No. 1 USNE Motorsports team sit atop the mountain thanks largely to an overwhelmingly consistent first half of the season.
The driver from Orchard Park, New York has amassed one victory, four top fives and seven top 10s through the opening eight races. His lone victory of the season thus far came in the most recent event at Claremont Motorsports Park, where he led a race-high 85 laps on his way to the 10th victory of his career.
This is hardly the first time Emerling has been a Modified Tour championship contender.
In 2021, Emerling had a breakout year, winning three times and leading the series standings early in the year before losing ground during the summer months to eventual series champion Justin Bonsignore.
Patrick Emerling won the most recent Modified Tour race at Claremont Motorsports Park, which helped catapult him to the top of the series standings. (Photo: Jaiden Tripi/NASCAR)
Emerling had one more victory than Bonsignore did that season, but Bonsignore proved to be the more consistent driver. His average finish of 5.1 compared to Emerling’s 6.4 average finish doesn’t seem like much, but that slight difference amounted to 22-point swing in Bonsignore’s favor at the end of the season.
It was a similar story in 2024 and 2025, as Emerling won multiple races each season but struggled to remain consistent. That resulted in championship finishes of third in 2024 and fifth in 2025.
So far this year, it appears Emerling has learned from his past mistakes.
Through the first eight races, Emerling has an average finish of 5.6. That’s tied for the best average finish this season with Beers, who sits five points behind Emerling entering Sunday’s Thunder in the Mountains 200 at White Mountain Motorsports Park. This is also the deepest into a season that Emerling has ever held the Modified Tour championship lead.
In addition, Emerling has completed every possible lap through the first eight races and has a worst finish of 13th, which came at Thompson Speedway Motorsports Park on April 12.
If Emerling can maintain the same consistency through the second half of the season that he’s shown through the first eight races, then he could easily become the 21st driver in history to call himself a Modified Tour champion.
Only time — and eight more races — will tell the story.
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Due to continued inclement weather forecasted for the North Woodstock area through the weekend, NASCAR and White Mountain Motorsports Park officials have postponed the Thunder in the Mountains 200 to Sunday, July 19 at 3 p.m. ET. An updated event schedule will be shared in the coming days.
The fourth ever NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour event at White Mountain was originally rescheduled for Saturday, July 18 at 8 p.m. ET.
Three different drivers have reached Victory Lane in the Modified Tour’s brief history at the quarter-mile asphalt oval. As the series enters the second half of the 2026 season, another driver will look to add his name alongside Justin Bonsignore, Doug Coby and Kyle Bonsignore as a White Mountain winner.
Patrick Emerling enters the weekend as the man to beat after capturing the checkered at last week’s Clash at Claremont Motorsports Park. His milestone 10th career victory made him just the 24th driver in Modified Tour history to record 10 or more wins. The result also moved him into the championship lead as former points leader Stephen Kopcik dropped to a last-place finish after battling power steering problems for much of the night.
Reigning Modified Tour champion Austin Beers will be poised to capitalize on any opportunity that presents itself. While the 2026 season has been relatively quiet by his standards, including the end of his 45-race top-10 streak, Beers has still recorded five top-five finishes through the first eight races, putting him in prime position to contend for his first victory of the year at White Mountain Motorsports Park.
Other notable entrants include Doug Coby, Matt Hirschman, Mike Christopher Jr., Tyler Rypkeman, Eric Goodale and Anthony Nocella.
NASCAR on Wednesday revealed rules updates to the Cup Series’ superspeedway package for Daytona International Speedway for the Aug. 29 regular-season finale.
The rear spoiler will be shortened from 7 inches to 4 inches, the same height as intermediate tracks, in an effort to reduce drag, along with a slight reduction in horsepower from 510 to 465 to adjust for the reduced downforce. NASCAR officials anticipate single-car runs to be approximately 3 mph faster than the current package, but cars in a pack are expected to run about the same speeds.
The changes come in advance of the Coke Zero Sugar 400 at Daytona, with hopes of less drag providing more opportunities for drivers to better move through the field by passing rather than relying upon track position through various fuel-saving strategies.
Three-time Daytona 500 champion Denny Hamlin and NASCAR Event Management president John Probst both served on a larger working group that determined possible adjustments, and they both appeared on NASCAR’s Inside the Race this week to explain. While these changes are set for the upcoming race at Daytona, any determination for future superspeedway races will be confirmed at a later date.
Hamlin, driver of the No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota and co-owner of 23XI Racing, noted the high quality of racing in Sunday night’s event at EchoPark Speedway near Atlanta in an appearance with former crew chief Steve Letarte and Probst on “Inside the Race.” He pointed to EchoPark’s 1.5-mile track length as a benefit of the 7-inch spoiler, but the 2.5-mile Daytona and 2.66-mile Talladega Superspeedway layouts offer fewer passing opportunities with the higher-drag 7-inch spoiler.
“What we’re essentially trying to recreate is Atlanta at Daytona and Talladega,” Hamlin said. “It happens organically at Atlanta, the space between the cars, because the cars themselves are grip-limited, and the fuel-mileage (racing) really doesn’t happen because you have to be on offense constantly. If you watch the pack, there is no saving. Guys are dicing it up the entire race. So this is what we’re aspiring to get to at some point. And it’s going to take chunks here and there. This is our first bite of the apple at this, so what I believe is that from the numbers that I’ve seen, it’s going to be roughly a 33% gain in the right direction.”
Letarte explained that the ultimate goal of switching to a shorter spoiler is to give drivers stuck mid-pack an outlet to create their own moves and build runs on the cars in front of them to overtake, rather than riding stuck in line.
“When I watch superspeedway racing currently, it seems like the leader is basically at terminal velocity,” Letarte told NASCAR.com. “It’s very easy to get a run on the leader and very hard to do anything with it. You pull out of line, you hit this wall of air, and for that reason, they’re just kind of stuck two-wide around the bottom. When superspeedway racing is most entertaining for me, it takes more work to generate an advantage or a run. But when you do generate that run, you are paid off in a dividend of overtaking. And really, I think it’s as simple as that.
“I think what I see currently is our biggest track-position races of the year are the superspeedways. That’s never been their signature. And we can talk about fuel and strategy, but the garage is going to try to win the race. So if the strategy demands track position, they’re going to do everything to get it. If the aero changes can allow teams to overtake to have faster cars and slower cars, I think it could open up the field a little bit and have just varying-speed cars because right now they all look like they run the same speed.”
The change comes in an attempt to improve superspeedway racing at NASCAR’s top level after adjustments made to do the same at other track types.
“As you’ve seen with NASCAR over the last few years, since the Next Gen, they’re not afraid to just keep fine-tuning it and getting it good at all these race tracks,” Hamlin said. “We’ve seen them make some horsepower adjustments on the short tracks in order to make those and road courses race better. Intermediates obviously speak for themselves; they don’t need a whole lot with how well the Next Gen races there. But then the next step is OK, let’s work on our superspeedway package from here on out. So I think that this was a great collaborative effort to get the racing product as good as it can be for the fans.”
Sean Gardner | Getty Images
Making this alteration with two superspeedway races remaining on the Cup Series calendar also feels like the right time for an adjustment, Letarte said.
“The unfortunate or fortunate part is our season kicks off with the biggest race of the year, the Daytona 500,” Letarte said. “And I believe that our car cycles, our rules cycles, are not the same. Everything doesn’t happen in the winter for another upcoming season. So I actually think this is the appropriate cycle for speedway racing. You have to remember, there’s no more win and you’re in. The Chase is about accumulating points. You’ve had 25 other races to score enough points to go down there with the unknown of what this race is going to be. We have a speedway race in The Chase that I think will be tough to then try something brand new. So I actually believe that this is the correct cycle. I think Daytona in August becomes a great test bed for then the ‘Great American Race’ in February.”
For NASCAR to act quickly in correcting a perceived issue is not a coincidence. A separate change was made to stage lengths at Talladega in the spring in an effort to reduce the incentive to save fuel. Probst points to leadership from the sport’s front office as a key driving force toward bettering the racing product.
“We want to react quickly,” Probst said. “You know, Steve O’Donnell, our new CEO, is on us all the time to get the feedback and react on the feedback as quick as we can. And I think that working with Denny and the working group there, we made changes that we felt had the highest potential to make a big change, but with the lowest risk as well. Like, we didn’t pull every lever that we could because some of those would frankly require us to get 15 cars down to Daytona and try some more radical stuff. We’re not against doing that, but that certainly would affect the timing in which you unroll that level of a change for.
“So we got that group together. I feel like everybody in there brought their opinion and provided really good feedback. And I think that where we landed is the biggest change we feel like we can make without doing a full-blown test.”
What comes next, officials anticipate, is maneuverability that allows drivers to reclaim their star power by earning their way back through the field on the track rather than through pit strategy.
“I can tell you from the driver’s seat what happens for us is that we spend the entire race fuel-mileage saving all for that last pit stop,” Hamlin said. “We basically know you have to be in the top four inside that last fuel window, unless there’s a big wreck, to have a shot at winning. I mean, if you come out 10th, you are log-jammed; you’re not going anywhere. And with the cars having as much drag as they have on them, then you can’t pull out of line to be offensive to get your track position back.
“So we’re trying to make it to where it allows the drivers to pull out of line when they get a run, and then hopefully create a little bit of space between them to allow them to get back in line, so it’s not going to make them so apprehensive to go make that bold move with 30 to go.”
The Coke Zero Sugar 400 is set for Saturday, Aug. 29, at Daytona International Speedway, with coverage at 7:30 p.m. ET on NBC, HBO Max, MRN Radio and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
Get ready for a trip back in time as the NASCAR Cup Series and Craftsman Truck Series venture to North Wilkesboro for a must-see doubleheader weekend. It’s the Cup Series’ first points-paying race at the North Carolina short track since 1996, after three trips there for the All-Star Race. The truckers have had North Wilkesboro on the regular-season schedule since 2023. See qualifying orders for both series this weekend.
Christopher Bell’s winless 2026 season is not at all the case of a driver searching for speed.
The No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing driver has simply been too good for too long for this year to be framed as a competitor who simply cannot close, either — Bell’s 13 career Cup Series wins over his first six seasons, four of which came last year alone, settle that argument before it starts. The Oklahoma native has repeatedly demonstrated that he knows what to do with a race-winning car, whether on dirt, asphalt, concrete, concrete covered in dirt, you name it.
And yet, 20 races into 2026, his season is becoming defined by everything but that final step — and it’s the one that matters most.
Five runner-up finishes. Eight top fives. A pole. Three stage wins. A fifth-best-in-the-series 422 laps led.
Zero wins.
That combination has placed Bell in increasingly rare company. His five runner-up finishes are the most by a winless driver in a season since friendly rival Kyle Larson had six in 2018. Through 20 races, only Terry Labonte in 1982 had more second-place finishes without a win; Harry Gant also had five at the same point in 1981.
The easiest read would be that Bell has repeatedly failed to convert opportunities. Dig deeper, and the accurate analysis reveals significantly more confounding context.
At Phoenix Raceway this spring, Bell led 176 laps, won the second stage and finished second to Ryan Blaney. Dominant, but a near-miss. He then came from 17th to finish second at Charlotte, leading 44 laps before rain helped hand the victory to Daniel Suárez. Bell started fourth and led 29 laps at Nashville before watching teammate Denny Hamlin nearly double his points output despite finishing just one spot higher. At Chicagoland, he followed another JGR teammate, Chase Briscoe, across the line, furiously chasing him down to no avail. Then, at EchoPark Speedway, Bell drove from 32nd to second and finished a frustrating 0.068 seconds behind Blaney, pushing the No. 12 to his second win of the season.
Those are five runner-up finishes, but not quite five copies of the same outcome. Bell sometimes had the dominant car. Sometimes he recovered from deep in the field. Sometimes, another championship-caliber driver was simply better by the end of the race.
Every time, though, the result was frustrating.
That said, the EchoPark run was the latest example of how much of the operation remains sound. NASCAR Insights ranked Bell fourth in defense and ninth in speed during the race, while the No. 20 pit crew ranked first. Bell’s season-long profile is even stronger: sixth in passing, fifth in speed, fourth on restarts and fourth in pit-crew performance — certainly championship-caliber.
Racing Insights’ deeper pit crew numbers support that ranking, too. Bell’s team owns the fastest average clean four-tire stop in the series at 9.56 seconds, a 95% clean-stop rate, and ranks second in line-to-line performance, retaining position on 82% of stops. The No. 20 team has not been consistently losing races because it lacks support around the driver on pit road.
It’s almost entirely race-context-driven. Not performance.
There may be no statistic that captures Bell’s season better than this one — his 422 laps led through 20 races are actually an increase of 268 over the same point last year. Bell had already won three times through 20 races (believe it or not, they actually all came in the first four races) in 2025 despite leading just 154 laps. This season, he has nearly tripled that total without reaching Victory Lane once.
Bell has also led more laps this year than JGR teammates Briscoe and Ty Gibbs combined. Both have won. Bell has not.
That is not remotely an indictment of No 20, but rather a notion worth investigating as to why his missing win remains so dubious.
The near-misses, of course, also extend beyond the five runner-up finishes. Bell was running second in overtime at Atlanta in February when contact from Carson Hocevar left him 21st. He was third before being collected in overtime at Kansas and fourth before running out of fuel with two laps remaining at Pocono. Racing Insights calculated those three results alone as a costly combined swing of 58 points.
Those are just regular-season losses now; not ideal, but survivable. The same pattern would carry much more weight in The Chase, particularly if he continues to be held out of Victory Lane.
Bell is ninth in points and sits 113 above the cutline, so Chase qualification is not the pressing concern. His 127 stage points rank sixth in the series, another indicator that the No. 20 has regularly operated near the front and will likely continue to do so a month and a half from now. The larger question is whether a driver — who certainly was among the preseason chalk picks for the championship — can reasonably be viewed as a title favorite after going an entire regular season without winning, regardless of how encouraging the underlying data may be. Numbers are numbers, after all, but you either have the points or don’t.
A winless Bell would still enter The Chase as dangerous, sure. He would also enter mostly as a projection of what could happen, not necessarily what will. Sure, Bell, perhaps more than most, is capable of ripping off consecutive victories, which would perhaps be necessary if he’s stuck in the middle of the Chase field and has title aspirations. But “can happen” and “will happen” are not the same. At all.
That does not make a title impossible; it just makes his case harder to trust.
James Gilbert | Getty Images
Which leads us here — North Wilkesboro is the logical place for Bell to take everything that was just laid out and turn it completely on its head.
The Cup Series has not held a points race there since 1996 — when a not-yet 2-year-old Bell had probably just mastered walking, let alone holding a steering wheel — so the modern evidence comes from three All-Star events (2023-25) rather than a conventional track history. But Bell’s sample is still meaningful. He won last year’s All-Star Race at the track, leading 28 laps, and his broader short-track resume makes the fit more than circumstantial. Bell has two wins, 21 top 10s and an 11.9 average finish in 35 career short-track starts. He has finished in the top 10 in 12 of the last 17, including a Bristol victory last September — his most recent Cup win, 27 races ago.
He also enters this weekend with three consecutive top-five 2026 finishes and back-to-back runner-ups, with the In-Season Challenge adding another layer on top. Bell’s matchup with Blaney — another of the series’ hottest drivers and Sunday’s EchoPark winner — puts the pairing under the spotlight as the ISC matchup of the week, adding even more pressure for Bell to perform. The duo is dead even at 82-82 in head-to-head better finishes during the Next Gen era, although Blaney owns a 12-8 advantage this season and a narrow 13-12 edge on short tracks since 2022.
Bell beating Blaney would advance him to the championship matchup next weekend at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Winning North Wilkesboro itself would accomplish that — but would also signify much more.
It would not retroactively ease the pain of every missed victory or erase the days that slipped away for reasons outside his control, but it would provide the one piece of evidence his otherwise formidable season still lacks: proof that all this speed, track position and organizational strength can produce a complete Sunday before the Chase begins. That may be the one remaining box to check over the next six weeks for him and crew chief Adam Stevens.
Bell does not need a win to validate his ability. He needs one to change the way his 2026 season — along with his championship prospects — is shaping up.
Bubba Wallace tried to avoid gaining positions after going below the out-of-bounds line on the final lap of Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at EchoPark Speedway.
But there was ultimately nothing that the 23XI Racing driver could have done to avoid being penalized.
“Unfortunately for Bubba, attempting to give the position back does not matter in this rule,” NASCAR vice president of racing communications Mike Forde said in a detailed behind-the-scenes discussion of the penalty during the latest episode of the “Hauler Talk” podcast. “If you go below the line and race below the line to improve your position, that’s where it happens.
“We determined that he did advance his position in a couple of areas. At a certain point, if you look at the replays, he’s in first, and it’s the last lap. So if there is a caution, there was a point pretty close to that start/finish line where he would have been declared the winner. Now he would have been black-flagged and still gone back to 29th, but certainly in our eyes, he advanced his position at that point. … At some point, he went below the line, and at some point, he did advance his position, and that was all that mattered, whether he intended it or not.”
Barring the penalty, Wallace would have finished second, though he had tried to stay in third. After going below the line beside race winner Ryan Blaney and Carson Hocevar, Wallace said he attempted to remain in third before a drafting push by Ty Gibbs put him in second.
“It’s unfortunate,” Wallace said. “If you look at SMT, I was all over the brakes trying to just give the spot back. It says don’t go below the yellow line and gain a position, which I didn’t. I was still third. I got a shove from (Ty Gibbs) to go to second, so technically, no positions were gained in doing that.”
Wallace’s team protested during the 20-minute post-race window that allows for contesting in-race penalties.
“(NASCAR vice president of competition) Elton Sawyer said they couldn’t have been more respectful,” Forde said about the team’s reaction to the penalty. “In the protest, they handled it very, very well. Everyone was level-headed, probably moreso than our folks expected, because it’s a blow. It’s a 27-point swing, and where he is on The Chase standings right now, it’s a little bit hairy for him. So they could have probably been guns blazing and really angry, but they handled it in a very professional manner.”
Forde also addressed questions about whether a penalty could be impacted by the pass being fully completed or a position being gained when a car was back above the line.
“The videos, it seemed like maybe he didn’t complete a pass or he didn’t get his nose ahead of it,” Forde said. “That does not come into play. If he did go below the line and eventually improved his position, he wouldn’t have gotten to where he did without going below the lines. That’s really what matters here in this case. He doesn’t have to actually make the pass while under the line. … Fully completing a pass where your rear bumper is now in front of the front bumper of the other car, that doesn’t matter at all. You just need to be a quarter of an inch ahead of the next car, and that’s improving your position, and it was pretty clear to us.”
The double-painted line rule is in effect at three tracks: EchoPark, Daytona International Speedway and Talladega Superspeedway. It’s been in place since 2001 and designed to keep drivers from using the apron as a passing lane, which had triggered massive wrecks in the past.
“I know some people don’t love the rule, but I think it probably would be a lot worse without it,” Forde said. “And that’s why we’ve kept it on the books for 25 years.”
Other topics covered by Forde and senior director of racing communications Amanda Ellis during the 62nd episode of “Hauler Talk,” which explores competition issues in NASCAR:
— How long it took to dry EchoPark.
— Whether NASCAR considered using its adverse conditions policy and ending the race earlier.
— Why there have been three consecutive Sunday night races in the Cup Series.
— The new short-track bumper package that will make its debut at North Wilkesboro Speedway.
Click on the embed below to listen or search for “Hauler Talk” wherever you download podcasts to hear it on your phone, tablet or mobile device.
Nate Ryan has written about NASCAR since 1996 while working at the San Bernardino Sun, Richmond Times-Dispatch, USA Today Co. and, for the past 10 years, at NBC Sports Digital. He is a contributor to the “Hauler Talk” show on the NASCAR Podcast Network. He has also covered various other motorsports, including the IndyCar and IMSA series.
After inclement weather forced the postponement of the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour’s planned trip to White Mountain Motorsports Park on June 20, the series is set to return to the quarter-mile oval this weekend for the Thunder in the Mountains 200 (Sunday, 3 p.m. ET on FloRacing).
White Mountain has built a proud history of racing since first opening in 1993, yet Sunday will only serve as the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour’s fourth visit to the facility. The first two races for the series at White Mountain only took place back in 2020, with the track added to the schedule following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The success of the first year despite the circumstances played a vital role in the Modified Tour returning to White Mountain in 2025. In those three events, White Mountain’s tight layout has offered Modified Tour competitors a small margin of error to utilize in their pursuit of a victory.
Three different drivers have reached the top of White Mountain during the Modified Tour’s brief history at the track. A fourth name will seek to join an elite group comprising of Justin Bonsignore, Doug Coby and Kyle Bonsignore as the Modified Tour enters the second half of the 2026 season.
Tickets to the Thunder in the Mountains 200 are available trackside. Below is everything to know ahead of Sunday’s race.
Sunday will only be the fourth time the Modified Tour has visited White Mountain Motorsports Park in its history. (Photo: Jaiden Tripi/NASCAR Regional)
Thunder in the Mountains 200 at White Mountain Motorsports Park
After eight NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour races this year, a four-man race has emerged for the 2026 championship.
Leading the way with a five-point advantage is Patrick Emerling, who just earned his first victory of the year at Claremont Speedway last weekend. Emerling hopes to translate that momentum into a strong performance at White Mountain Motorsports Park, a track where he has not finished better than 15th across his three previous appearances.
Reigning NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour champion Austin Beers will be ready to capitalize on any misfortune Emerling encounters Sunday. The 2026 season has been quiet for Beers, who saw his top-10 streak come to an end after 45 races, yet five top fives in eight races have Beers in an optimal position to earn his first victory of 2026 on Sunday.
Sitting third in the Modified Tour standings is Jon McKennedy, who possesses two victories this season at Seekonk Speedway and Oxford Plains Raceway. Like Emerling, McKennedy has contested all three series events at White Mountain, but his best finish there is a fourth during the second race in 2020.
An early spin for Stephen Kopcik at Claremont saw him drop from the top of the Modified Tour standings to fourth, 10 points behind Emerling. Claremont was a low point amidst a breakout season for Kopcik that includes two victories, so he looks to bounce back at White Mountain, where he finished runner-up to Kyle Bonsignore last year.
The four contenders will have to deal with plenty of other talented names Sunday if they wish to bolster their Modified Tour championship odds. Those names include a past White Mountain winner in Doug Coby, along with Matt Hirschman, Mike Christopher Jr., Tyler Rypkeman, Eric Goodale and Anthony Nocella.
A full entry list for the Thunder in the Mountains 200 will be released later this week.
With the championship picture in the Modified Tour taking place, Sunday’s Thunder in the Mountains 200 is a perfect chance for the frontrunners to build momentum over the second half of 2026. (Photo: Jaiden Tripi/NASCAR Regional)
SCHEDULE: Sunday, July 19: Practice from 11:20 a.m. to 12:10 p.m. … American Racer Pole Award qualifying at 1:30 p.m. … Start of the Thunder in the Mountains 200 (200 Laps / 50 Miles) at 3 p.m. ET.
QUALIFYING: Two consecutive qualifying laps. Faster lap determines qualifying position. Adjustments or repairs may not be made on the vehicle after the vehicle has taken the green flag at the start/finish line. NASCAR reserves the right to have more than one vehicle engage in qualifying runs at the same time. Starting field for the Thunder in the Mountains 200 is limited to 28 starters including Provisional Positions.
TIRE ALLOTMENT: The maximum tire allotment available for this event is ten (10) tires per team. All tires used for qualifying and the race must be purchased at the track and scanned by NASCAR Officials, unless otherwise approved in advance by the Series Director. Four (4) tires must be used for qualifying and to begin the race. All qualifying tires must remain in impound until released by NASCAR Officials. The remaining tire allotment may be used for practice and/or change tires during the event. A maximum of two (2) tires of the allotment may be used as change tires. The tire change rule is two (2) tires per stop. This includes “swapping” tires front to back.
RE-DRAW PROCEDURE: The fastest qualifier will spin the wheel to determine the number of drivers that will re-draw for their starting positions: 4, 6, 8 or 10 positions will re-draw. Once the fastest qualifier spins the wheel, NASCAR will have the various buckets ready to immediately start the re-draw procedure. Driver will re-draw in their qualifying order after qualifying has been completed (1 through 10, or however many are applicable). The pole position and/or any bonus point(s), if applicable, will be awarded to the fastest qualifier and will be the pole of record. If, due to adverse conditions, qualifying is canceled, the field will be set in accordance with the 2026 NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour Rule Book. The re-draw procedure will still take place regardless of how the field is set.
For the NASCAR Cup Series’ first points-paying race at North Wilkesboro Speedway since 1996, Goodyear will bring a familiar tire setup for 450 laps in the North Carolina mountains (Sun., 7 p.m. ET, TNT Sports, truTV, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Cup teams will use a package utilized twice in the past: each of the last two races at nearby Martinsville Speedway. Additionally, the right-side tires have raced twice this year at Bowman Gray Stadium and Phoenix Raceway.
While this is a new addition to the official Cup schedule, premier series teams visited the 0.625-mile short track each of the last three years for the exhibition All-Star Race.
“Three years of All-Star Race data has helped us prepare for the NASCAR Cup Series’ first points race at North Wilkesboro in 30 years,” said Rick Heinrich, Goodyear NASCAR product manager. “The Goodyear Racing Eagle tire package we are bringing is one teams know well and is backed by years of short-track data at the likes of Martinsville, combined with what we’ve learned in previous years at North Wilkesboro, one of NASCAR’s most historic tracks.”
Meanwhile, the Craftsman Truck Series will utilize a new tire setup. The right-side tires have raced several times, including last year at North Wilkesboro, but the left-side tires are brand new. The specifications used by the tailgaiters were first introduced for the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series at Phoenix Raceway, but have yet to debut in the Truck Series.
Tire allotment for each team competing this weekend:
Cup Series: 10 total sets — 8 new for the race, 1 for qualifying, which transfers to the race, and 1 for practice. Teams will also have 4 wet-weather sets available, if needed. Craftsman Truck Series: 5 total sets — 3 new for the race, 1 for qualifying, which transfers to the race, and 1 for practice. Teams will also have 3 wet-weather sets available, if needed.
NASCAR.com’s Pat DeCola ranks the top 20 Cup Series drivers competing for the 2026 championship after Ryan Blaney’s win at EchoPark Speedway and before Sunday’s Window World 450 at North Wilkesboro Speedway (7 p.m. ET, TNT Sports, truTV, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Analysis: Hamlin’s EchoPark night was mostly damage control, and it worked well enough to keep him atop both the standings and these rankings. Starting 28th, the No. 11 never became a true win factor but salvaged 12th, added Stage 2 points and left with a 24-point advantage over Tyler Reddick — but has a hard-charging Ryan Blaney behind him who is now a concern for both. North Wilkesboro should offer considerably more upside: Hamlin finished second there in the 2024 All-Star Race and the short-track star also led 292 laps before finishing runner-up at Martinsville earlier this season. The early summer winning streak has cooled, but his command of the championship picture has not disappeared with it.
Analysis: Reddick did not reclaim the points lead at EchoPark, but he made the conversation much tighter. No. 45 charged from 31st, finished second in both stages and came home eighth, cutting Hamlin’s cushion nearly in half without ever truly controlling the race. His North Wilkesboro sample carries more promise than warning, highlighted by a third-place run in the 2023 All-Star Race and seventh there last season. Reddick is back within one strong weekend of turning the points lead again, though the short-track portion of his resume is not quite as imposing as the season built around it — or that of the guy he’s chasing.
Analysis: So much for merely occupying a sturdy third lane. Blaney obliterated the field for much of the night at EchoPark, sweeping the stages, leading 171 of 263 laps and reclaiming the top spot on the final circuit to earn his second victory of 2026 in dominant yet dramatic fashion. He has now finished in the top 10 eight straight times — the longest such streak of his career — and has thus cut a once-massive points deficit to 65. Between his Phoenix win earlier this year and top-six results in two of the past three North Wilkesboro All-Star Races, the schedule offers no obvious reason for the No. 12’s momentum to stall now.
Analysis: No. 54 did not win at EchoPark, but leading 32 laps and finishing fourth after starting 23rd while also facing the pressure of holding a provisional top-five Chase standing added another entry to the growing file labeled “serious contender, Ty Gibbs.” He now owns eight top-five finishes through 20 races, remains fourth in points and continues to extract strong days from races that initially appear headed elsewhere. North Wilkesboro is also the perfect place to revisit what Gibbs can do on a short track: He led 53 laps in the 2023 Open before finishing second, then led all 100 circuits to win it in 2024. Add his Bristol victory and Martinsville fourth earlier this season, and the No. 54 has a far stronger argument this week than merely being the youngest guy near the top.
Analysis: Elliott’s 13th at EchoPark was serviceable (he did advance in the In-Season Challenge, after all), albeit not memorable, though he briefly led and emerged from the chaos with another intact points day. The No. 9 remains fifth in the standings, but the gap between his early-season punch and current rhythm is noticeable. North Wilkesboro may be the venue that closes it: Elliott has finished fifth, eighth and fifth in the three modern All-Star Races there, and his Martinsville victory in March remains a top-tier short-track credential. Nothing about Sunday guarantees a breakthrough, but few drivers bring a cleaner combination of recent track form and 2026 short-track success.
Analysis: Bell’s climb continues, and EchoPark required him to earn every inch of it. After starting 32nd, he worked to the front, led twice, supplied the decisive push that launched Blaney toward the win and finished second for his fifth runner-up result of the season. That is a maddening number for a driver still seeking victory No. 1, but he’s clearly close, with five top fives in the last eight races. Now comes North Wilkesboro, where Bell chased down Joey Logano late to win last year’s All-Star Race. He is no longer searching for normalcy — and should be close to or at 100% this weekend in terms of his wrist injury — he is searching for the final few feet between repeated contention and finally closing on a win.
Analysis: Larson’s season continues to be a weekly exercise in finding new ways to separate speed from outcome. No. 5 ran near the front again at EchoPark, led four laps and remained in the mix deep into the night before two late incidents left him 34th and five laps down. There’s hope on the horizon, however. North Wilkesboro is not simply a potential rebound spot — it is where Larson won the 2023 All-Star Race after leading 145 laps and the Craftsman Truck Series race the same weekend after pacing 138. His broader short-track record includes six wins, 22 top fives and 36 top 10s in 66 starts. At some point, one of these tailor-made opportunities will stop turning into another paragraph about what might have been, along with his growing winless streak.
Analysis: Buescher’s 10th-place EchoPark finish was vintage No. 17: not especially noisy, but useful enough to keep the larger season picture on task. The RFK driver remains in the championship picture, though he watched faster Toyotas and Penske Fords command most of the night. North Wilkesboro has offered both ends of the spectrum — 16th in 2023, third in 2024 and 10th last season — which makes the 2024 result the more important clue given RFK Racing’s short-track capability; he can definitely get it done here. Buescher is still accumulating the body of work of a true 2026 title contender, but the only missing ingredient remains a race that unmistakably belongs to him.
Analysis: The spotlight found Hocevar before EchoPark and stayed on him until the checkered flag, yet he never appeared an ounce bothered by it. After a highly public weekend centered on his Zane Smith feud, the No. 77 led five times for 25 laps, carried the field to the white flag and finished third after one final frantic exchange with Blaney and Wallace. North Wilkesboro is hardly unfamiliar terrain: Hocevar won last year’s All-Star Open after leading the final 46 laps and finished fourth in the 2023 Craftsman Truck Series race after leading 16. He is having one of the best seasons of his young career while everybody is looking directly at him — and so far, that appears to be exactly how he likes it.
Analysis: One ugly result does not erase the Sonoma runner-up and Chicagoland victory, but Briscoe’s EchoPark crash stopped his surge cold enough to drop him three positions here. He scored points in Stage 1 and remained on the lead lap until the late pileup, ultimately finishing 36th and giving back 27 points relative to the Chase cut. His North Wilkesboro results are encouraging — all top 10s — but trending the wrong way: fourth in the 2023 All-Star Race, seventh in the 2024 Open and ninth in last year’s main event. The No. 19’s midsummer form still carries more weight than one drafting-track wipeout, but the immediate task is proving the heater survives outside its two headline weekends.
Analysis: Suárez’s EchoPark finish landed him 21st, yet the day contained more substance than that number suggests. He finished fifth in Stage 2, charged from 20th to fifth after one restart and spent portions of the middle stage looking capable of something much better before fading from contention. North Wilkesboro carries a similar split personality: Suárez led the opening 54 laps of the 2023 All-Star Race and finished seventh, then produced 15th and 23rd in the next two editions. With 91 points separating him from the cutline, he can afford a modest week; what would help more is rediscovering the version of No. 7 that dictated terms earlier this year rather than merely hoping to bank what remained.
Analysis: Byron’s Chicagoland revival did not travel cleanly to EchoPark. He started 26th, scored no stage points and finished 16th, returning the No. 24 to the murky middle ground it has occupied too often since the spring, all the while trading barbs with his crew chief. North Wilkesboro has not been a natural showcase either, though sixth place with 12 laps led last season was a substantial step forward from 20th and 19th in the previous two All-Star Races. His fifth earlier this year at Martinsville provides a stronger short-track indicator than the exhibition history alone. The talent and speed are still easy to locate; the uninterrupted run of weekends proving it lately remains far more elusive.
Analysis: SVG’s sixth-place EchoPark finish deserves more attention than it will probably receive, but it’s very much worth commending. He finished sixth in both visits to the track this season and now owns three oval top 10s in 2026, continuing to chip away at the idea that his relevance begins and ends when the schedule turns left and right. North Wilkesboro supplied another piece of that development last year, when he led the first 54 laps of the Open before Hocevar took control, while an 11th-place Martinsville run showed he can navigate a traditional — and difficult — short track without disappearing. This is not yet a weekly oval contender, but it is no longer especially wise to assume the No. 97 will be overwhelmed by one.
Analysis: Cindric quietly had one of the richest points nights around the Chase bubble at EchoPark. He finished fifth and fourth in the two stages before settling 14th, gaining five points on the cut and stretching his advantage to 32. His North Wilkesboro record is considerably less flattering — 21st, 20th in the Opens and 18th in the 2025 race the last three years — though eighth at Martinsville earlier this season offers a more current reason for confidence. No. 2 does not need to become a short-track revelation Sunday. Cindric simply cannot let one of his weakest recent venues erase the margin he just worked to create.
Analysis: Wallace crossed the line second at EchoPark and left with a 29th-place finish, which is a violent swing after an extremely long night. He led 11 laps and helped liven the race’s closing act, but NASCAR ruled that he advanced below the yellow line on the final lap and dropped him down the running order, costing him 22 points against the cut. North Wilkesboro is a far more conventional opportunity for the No. 23: Wallace finished second in the 2023 All-Star Race, sixth in 2024 and fifth in that weekend’s 2023 Truck race after leading 13 laps. The ranking drop reflects the points damage, not a disappearance of speed, and this may be one of his cleaner rebound spots left.
Analysis: Jones has gone from bubble occupant to bubble survivor, and EchoPark bought him another week of oxygen. His fifth-place finish helped him match his entire 2025 top-10 total at five and moved him eight points above Joey Logano for the final provisional Chase position. North Wilkesboro has been uneven — eighth in the 2023 All-Star Race, 18th in the 2024 Open and fourth in last year’s Open — but the most recent result at least points in the preferred direction. The Jones-led Legacy Motor Club revival does not need a trophy Sunday, but it does need another day that keeps No. 43 from handing a spot back.
Analysis: The landscape could be about to change, because here comes the track Logano has probably had circled since the schedule was released. His ninth-place EchoPark result, supported by fourth- and third-place stage finishes, pulled him to eight points below the cut and supplied another hint that Team Penske is finally gaining traction beyond Blaney. North Wilkesboro is where Logano led 199 of 200 laps to win the All-Star Race in 2024, then dominated another 139 before Bell passed him late last season. He also finished third at Martinsville this spring. For weeks, No. 22’s potential rebound has felt like a low simmer, and Sunday offers the most credible chance yet to convert it into something real.
Analysis: Preece’s EchoPark result did nothing to slow the points leak. He led one lap during the pit cycle but finished 24th, losing 22 more points against the cut and falling 26 below Jones after briefly working his way onto the good side of the line last month. North Wilkesboro is not entirely hopeless territory — Preece placed fourth in the 2023 Open, eighth in 2024 and 11th last season — and his 12th at Martinsville suggests a competent baseline. But with six races remaining, the No. 60 needs to stop producing weekends that require the next one to repair the previous one.
Analysis: Chastain re-enters after an 11th-place EchoPark run that looked modest on paper but moved him within 45 points of The Chase. That is still a substantial deficit, though not quite the dead zone it resembled earlier in the summer. North Wilkesboro has become increasingly productive for him: 11th in 2023, seventh in 2024 and third last season. Add 14 laps led at Martinsville this spring, and there is enough short-track evidence to view this as an opening rather than another survival exercise. No. 1 still needs a much bigger swing than 11th, but at least the schedule is beginning to cooperate.
Analysis: Keselowski remains last here because every supposed launch point keeps becoming another missed departure. He started 10th at EchoPark, finished 26th, scored no stage points and fell 43 below the cut despite entering a stretch built around tracks expected to suit Ford and RFK Racing. North Wilkesboro provides one last compelling historical case: Keselowski led 62 laps in last year’s All-Star Race before crashing from contention, though his other modern finishes there are 19th and 16th. The No. 6 clearly knew how to find speed at this place 14 months ago. Whether any of it survived the season-plus since is now the more urgent question.
