Preview: Round 4 of the 2026 In-Season Challenge at North Wilkesboro

Posted on July 16, 2026 by Nathan Solomon

Just four drivers remain in the 2026 In-Season Challenge, and while the biggest wild card — EchoPark Speedway — is in the rearview mirror, an unknown still lies ahead. The Cup Series heads to North Wilkesboro Speedway on Sunday (7 p.m. ET, TNT Sports, truTV, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) for the first points-paying race in the North Carolina foothills since 1996. Though these drivers have dueled it out for $1 million in the All-Star Race there in years past, it’s difficult to set expectations for a marathon 450-lap event.

Round 3 at EchoPark provided plenty of excitement and tightly contested battles, including No. 25 seed Todd Gilliland advancing over No. 32 seed Alex Bowman by just two positions. No. 4 Chase Elliott advanced by 23 positions over No. 12 Chase Briscoe, but that doesn’t tell the story, as both drivers contended for the win until Briscoe crashed late. No. 10 seed Christopher Bell knocked off Joe Gibbs Racing teammate and No. 2 seed Denny Hamlin, and of course, No. 3 seed Ryan Blaney dominated the night to win the race and eliminate No. 11 seed William Byron.

If you’re a fan of college basketball, this semifinal round couldn’t line up any better. Three drivers represent three blue-blood organizations, while a Cinderella story looks to continue wreaking havoc throughout the bracket.

ROUND 4 MATCHUPS:

(No. 3) Ryan Blaney vs. (No. 10) Christopher Bell
(No. 4) Chase Elliott vs. (No. 25) Todd Gilliland

TRACK BREAKDOWN

Because the Cup Series hasn’t contested a points-paying race at the 0.625-mile short track in this era, it’s tough to pin down the exact list of contenders. The All-Star Race gives at least some sample size, but a much shorter race combined with a much smaller field doesn’t fully paint the picture. All four remaining drivers, however, have stout short-track resumes.

This season, Blaney has the second-best average finish at 4.0 in this style of racing — only to Ty Gibbs — and is third best in both total points (94) and laps led (192). His seven consecutive short-track top 10s are tops in Cup, and he won earlier in the season at Phoenix. Speaking of winners, his opponent, Bell, banked the 2025 All-Star Race at North Wilkesboro. Previous victories at Bristol, Martinsville, Phoenix and New Hampshire show he’s plenty capable — even though a win hasn’t been in the cards … yet … this season.

Meanwhile, Elliott has a victory in the two true short-track races this season, winning this spring at Martinsville. He’s generally a factor at every type of track, and North Wilkesboro could provide an opportunity for Chevrolet to catch up to red-hot Toyota. Don’t forget about Gilliland, though. While he hasn’t contended at short tracks, he owns four top 10s in 25 starts and finished sixth this spring at Bristol.

Bigger picture, according to Racing Insights, the driver who led the most laps won just once in the last five short-track races. At both Martinsville and Bristol earlier this year, a driver swept the stages but didn’t win the race, and two of the last four short-track winners didn’t score any stage points. What does this mean? One strategy call could easily shake up how Round 4 plays out.

MATCHUP OF THE WEEK: (No. 3) Ryan Blaney vs. (No. 10) Christopher Bell

With a spot in the Champions Round on the line, two of the best at flat tracks will go head-to-head in the Cup Series’ first points-paying race at North Wilkesboro Speedway since 1996.

Through three In-Season Challenge races, these two drivers have been flawless. Blaney won a thriller on Sunday at EchoPark Speedway — leading a race-best 171 laps — and hasn’t finished worse than seventh all tournament. Bell doesn’t have a win yet this season, but his stretch of three consecutive top fives nearly one-ups his rival.

But with both riding significant momentum — and both carrying impressive short-track resumes — this matchup is a complete toss-up. Six of Bell’s 13 Cup victories are at shorter, flatter tracks, and he also boasts a North Wilkesboro victory in last year’s exhibition All-Star Race. Blaney has similar numbers with six short-track wins — and Ford always seems to thrive at those types of circuits. In three All-Star events at North Wilkesboro, Blaney has two top 10s.

Heading into the semifinal round, both of these drivers have found their stride at the right time — and this head-to-head in the North Carolina mountains will surely come down to the wire.

Getty Images

MORE: Recap Round 3 action

KEY MATCHUP: (No. 4) Chase Elliott vs. (No. 25) Todd Gilliland

Gilliland’s certainly facing an uphill battle both on the track and in popularity contests by facing 2020 Cup champion and perennial most popular driver Elliott. In three All-Star Races at North Wilkesboro, Elliott’s been one of the best, never finishing worse than eighth. Meanwhile, Gilliland never qualified for an All-Star Race at the track and has never finished better than 12th in the All-Star Open.

The odds are certainly in Elliott’s favor here. Even though the No. 9 Hendrick Motorsports driver is quietly on a slide with just one top 10 in his last nine races, he still finds a way to maximize days and finish races. That said, both he and Gilliland have had lady luck on their side over the last three weeks. The Front Row Motorsports driver hasn’t finished better than 16th during the In-Season Challenge, but benefited from uncharacteristically bad days from opposing Spire Motorsports drivers Daniel Suárez and Carson Hocevar in the first two rounds, before last week’s opponent, Bowman, suffered damage in a late wreck. The same goes for Elliott’s opponent last week, Briscoe, who contended for a chunk of the night before exiting in the same crash.

Is it likely for Gilliland to pull another upset? No. But with some unknowns heading to North Wilkesboro and an opportunity for some potentially wild strategy, a window at least exists.

Posted on July 15, 2026July 15, 2026 by Nathan Solomon

CONCORD, N.C. — Three blue bloods highlighted the 2018 men’s college basketball Final Four. Villanova. Michigan. Kansas.

The fourth team? Loyola Chicago.

Similarly, three powerhouse drivers spotlight the In-Season Challenge semifinals. Ryan Blaney. Chase Elliott. Christopher Bell.

The fourth driver? Todd Gilliland.

Maybe he doesn’t feel quite as dangerous as the Ramblers that March. But the No. 34 Front Row Motorsports driver still has an opportunity to pull off the unthinkable in Sunday’s semifinal Round 4 at North Wilkesboro Speedway (7 p.m. ET, TNT Sports, truTV, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

“We’ve been barely hanging on by the skin of our teeth each one of these rounds,” Gilliland told reporters Wednesday at the NASCAR Production Facility. “But we’re here now, and now we only got two more guys to beat.”

Entering the In-Season Challenge as the No. 25 seed, the Californian turned North Carolinian barely scraped by in each of the first three rounds. Gilliland’s 29th-place finish at Sonoma knocked out No. 8 seed Daniel Suárez after the Spire Motorsports driver suffered an early tire failure, forcing him to run the race on an alternative strategy. At Chicagoland, he finished 16th, but also benefited from the Zane Smith/Carson Hocevar melee as Hocevar suffered damage and placed outside the top 20.

And for most of Sunday night’s race at EchoPark, which stretched into Monday morning, it seemed as if Gilliland’s fairy-tale story had an expiration date. Admittedly, all three FRM cars struggled over the course of 400-plus miles, but when opponent and No. 32 seed Alex Bowman suffered damage in a late crash, his window suddenly opened.

Bowman lined up just behind the 26-year-old for the overtime restart. At that moment, Gilliland knew the stakes with $1 million still on the line.

“Maybe the first time I have heard anything about the In-Season [Challenge] over the radio or during the race was after [Bowman] spun and he restarted right on my bumper,” Gilliland explained. “I was at least hoping to keep him behind me. If it didn’t happen, it didn’t happen, but I wasn’t going to do anything crazy. It would be nice to keep this one single car behind me, and we were able to do that.

“It has been a lot of fun just to see my team kind of buy into something and have something to kind of look at and pay attention to. Obviously, we’re all competitors and we’re competing against 36, 37 other guys out there, but it is just fun and a little bit of something different.”

Widening the scope, through 20 races — and just six until the 16-driver Chase field is set — Gilliland ranks 24th in series points, 93 points behind the provisional cutline. He has only one top 10 with an average finish a half a spot better (20.8) than 2025 (21.3).

MORE: Cup Series standings | Gilliland driver page | Front Row Motorsports

Now in his fifth full-time Cup season, Gilliland realizes the door for a postseason berth is rapidly closing, and barring unusual circumstances, he’ll be on the outside looking in. A stretch of four tracks roughly a mile or shorter over the next six races, though, has the No. 34 Ford driver encouraged about what could lie ahead.

“Going back to some short tracks will be really good for us,” he said. “When we show up to places like Martinsville, Richmond, those are places that I feel like we should be able to go out and honestly compete in the top 10 all day. North Wilkesboro, I feel like, should be in that category, but we’ve never really ran that great there [in three All-Star Weekends].

“I think consistency still just needs to be our main goal from the 34 side. Seeing what [teammate] Zane Smith has done, I think he’s shown much more speed than us, which is always tough to kind of look yourself in the mirror, and I think that goes for everyone on my team. He’s kind of showing us what the potential of our cars and our team can do. There’s definitely some room to improve, but we’re trying to chip away at it.”

With a date in the semifinals against No. 4 seed Chase Elliott, Gilliland is most certainly an underdog. The 2020 Cup Series champion is a contender nearly every week and has three All-Star top 10s at North Wilkesboro. However, Gilliland has shown flashes at short tracks with a sixth-place finish at Bristol this spring, plus a pair of top 10s in the last three Martinsville races.

Even if his underdog journey ends in the semifinals, as Loyola’s did, the still-budding driver hopes this In-Season Challenge run can create a team boost for the rest of the campaign.

“I think there’s small wins along the way,” Gilliland said, “But I definitely think from an enthusiasm side, attitude side in the shop, that this In-Season [Challenge] — any positive momentum — can definitely help us.”

Meg Oliphant | Getty Images

Posted on July 15, 2026 by Brandon White

If Doug Coby believed he was no longer capable of winning on the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour, he would not be starting races.

The six-time series champion is embarking on a partial schedule with Jett Motorsports, a new team to the Modified Tour co-owned by Jariah Roderick and Steve Rollins. Through three races, Coby’s results with Jett Motorsports have been mixed, with his best showing being a ninth in the first trip to Seekonk Speedway.

Despite this, Coby knows Jett Motorsports can be a race-winning program on the Modified Tour; they just need to put a full weekend together. The next event for Coby at White Mountain Motorsports Park on Sunday (3 p.m. ET on FloRacing) brings plenty of optimism; he is one of three drivers to have won a Modified Tour race there.

A lot has changed for Coby since that victory, but he is ready to finally showcase the drive that guided him to Victory Lane on 35 previous occasions.

“I’m looking forward to going back [to White Mountain],” Coby said. “I haven’t competed there since my win in the COVID season, so I might be a little behind. I really just love racing quarter miles where you can get after it. There’s a balance between aggression, skill, patience and knowing when to make your move or chill out for a little while.”

The last time Coby won a Modified Tour race was 2023 at Monadnock Speedway in Tommy Baldwin Racing’s iconic No. 7NY, an opportunity for which he remains grateful.

Coby’s partnership with Baldwin began after he was chosen to fill in for Jimmy Blewett at Riverhead Raceway in 2022 while the latter dealt with a family emergency. At that time, Coby was looking for a Modified Tour ride following a brief-but-successful stint with Phil Moran.

Baldwin’s decision to put Coby in the No. 7NY immediately paid off, as he put together a dominant race-winning performance at Riverhead that saw him lead 196 of 213 laps. The next two years saw Coby continue the stellar legacy of Baldwin’s No. 7NY with three more checkered flags.

For as efficient as the combination of Coby and Baldwin was, none of their ventures were full time. As Baldwin put more focus into his NASCAR Cup Series obligations along with the careers of his sons Luke and Jack, Coby’s races in the No. 7NY dwindled; he only contested one event for Baldwin in 2025.

Four of Doug Coby’s 35 NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour victories came while driving Tommy Baldwin Jr.’s No. 7NY Modified. (Photo: Nick Grace/NASCAR)

Coby diverted his focus back to his day job in real estate all while keeping an eye on available rides. A conversation with Cam McDermott, Kyle Bonsignore’s crew chief, introduced Coby to Roderick and Rollins, who were interested in expanding their operation Jett Motorsports into the Modified Tour.

The opportunity was so intriguing that Coby enlisted the help of numerous crew members from his time driving for owners like Wayne Darling and Mike Smeriglio III, with both of whom he won titles. Coby wants all that experience to translate into a winning formula for Jett Motorsports, but the process is taking longer than he would like.

“These guys want to build a team with some experience behind the wheel and in the pit area, too,” Coby said. “That’s why a lot of my guys came out of semi-retirement with me. [My crew chief] John McKenna came over with us, and we’re definitely having some fun working together again. I just want to get back to competing for wins.

“It’ll be really special when this team is able to do that.”

Coby partially attributed Jett Motorsports’ slow start to circumstances outside of their control, but he also expected growing pains. Jett Motorsports is still adapting to the rules and the competitive atmosphere of the Modified Tour, but Coby is willing to be patient with helping the program grow.

McKenna’s presence and leadership has been a major benefit from Coby’s perspective. The composed, methodical nature of McKenna is something Coby believes has made everyone at Jett Motorsports comfortable while working through their struggles.

Given how frustrating the first three races have been at times, Coby emphasized the importance of a loose-but-productive environment at Jett Motorsports. If everyone stays on the same page, Coby knows the results everyone expects will eventually materialize.

“We came out of the gate a few races behind everybody at Thompson,” Coby said. “We thought we learned something for Seekonk and we got tricked at Seekonk. We made some more adjustments, came back to Seekonk and got tricked again. We’re learning like everybody, but we feel like we’ve got the people and the equipment to get some wins.”

Being with a new team going into White Mountain this weekend does not concern Coby in the slightest. He was only three races in with Moran’s program when he won there back in 2020, a feat he accomplished despite the limitations associated with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Despite a slow start with Jett Motorsports, Doug Coby is optimistic he can win a race with the organization. (Photo: Rachel O’Driscoll/NASCAR)

For Coby to replicate his race-winning performance from White Mountain six years ago, he and Jett Motorsports will need to put together their most efficient weekend to date. There are plenty of ideas Coby and McKenna are exchanging with Roderick and Rollins on how to sustain the speed the No. 28 Nucar Modified has shown in practice.

Whatever the missing ingredient is, Coby believes it can be found by applying all the knowledge acquired with Jett Motorsports so far.

“We were the fastest car in the first practice at Seekonk and sixth fastest on the second practice, but the day just kept steadily going downhill from there,” Coby said. “That’s just uncharacteristic for our team, but we’re hoping if we have a good car in practice that it translates into a solid qualifying run.

“You can’t keep starting mid-pack thinking you’re going to blast through the field in this series. It hasn’t happened in the last 20 years.”

Coby has more experience winning Modified Tour events than any other driver entered in Sunday’s Thunder in the Mountains 200. The first checkered flag for Coby came in 2006 with Curt Chase at Stafford Motor Speedway, a race in which he started 29^th.

Now 46, Coby views himself as an unofficial ambassador for the Modified Tour. He wants to see the series that defined him continue to grow and prosper amidst an always evolving industry, adding that winning races with upstart teams like Jett Motorsports is a great way to do so.

Coby finding Victory Lane across his remaining starts with Jett Motorsports would make them the sixth team he has won with on the Modified Tour after Chase, Darling, Smeriglio, Moran and Baldwin. Even though kinks are still being ironed out, Coby is confident a win with Jett Motorsports comes closer to reality with every passing race.

“[Bringing] another chassis, another team, crew chief and car owner [to Victory Lane] would be awesome,” Coby said. “At this stage of the game, that’s kind of really what is left in my career; teaming up with new people, trying to be as professional as possible and bringing new sponsors and new car owners into Victory Lane on the Modified Tour.

“That’s what gets new people interested and that’s what keeps car owners like Jariah and Steve engaged and interested. It would be a huge win for our team, and I’m sure there would be no shortage of fun afterwards if that were to happen.”

Five races remain for Coby with Jett Motorsports in 2026 after White Mountain. The goal for Coby is to snap his three-year winless drought, but a top five would be a step in the right direction, especially after the early season issues.

Coby knows he can win. He also knows Jett Motorsports can win. The next step is to put all the pieces together and show the Modified Tour just how strong they are as a group.

Posted on July 15, 2026July 15, 2026 by Adam Fenwick

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.

Posted on July 15, 2026 by Press Release

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.

Posted on July 15, 2026July 18, 2026 by Staff Report

Thunder in the Mountains 200

White Mountain Motorsports Park

Entry list

Car No.	Driver	Team	Crew Chief	Chassis Mfg.	Sponsor
1	Patrick Emerling	USNE Motorsports	Dale Hedquist	LFR	USNE Power
3	Tyler Rypkema	BRE Racing	Greg Fournier	Boehler Racing	Northeast Drilling; SYP
05	Teddy Hodgdon IV	Teddy Hodgdon Racing	Ted Hodgdon	FURY Race Cars	Business Time Motorsports; The Landau Team of Re/Max; Montanari Fuel
8	John-Michael Shenette	Eighty-Two Autosport	Scott Morin	LFR	USNE Power Charlotte, Eighty-Two Services, Heintz Performance
9	Jayden Harman	Wanick Motorsports	Mark Harman	Troyer	Wanick Construction; Harman Funeral Home
18	Ken Heagy	Heagy Motorsports	Greg Gorman	FURY Race Cars	Merkel Racing Engines
21	Stephen Kopcik	Wanick Motorsports	Nick Kopcik	Troyer	Wanick Construction; Newtown Pools
28	Doug Coby	Jett Motorsports	John Mckenna	LFR	Nucar
31	Michael Christopher Jr.	Elite Motorsports	Eugene Orlando	LFR	Elite Towing; Elite Racing; Baker Racing
54	Tommy Catalano	Catalano Motorsports	Rick Kluth	Troyer	FX Caprara; USNE Power
56	Trevor Catalano	Catalano Motorsports	David Catalano	Troyer	USNE Power
58	Eric Goodale	Goodie Motorsports	Rob Hyer	FURY Race Cars	GAF Roofing Riverhead Building Supply
60	Matt Hirschman	Pee Dee Motorsports	Mike Stein	Troyer	Bar Harbor Bank & Trust; Pee Dee Motorsports
64	Austin Beers	KLM Motorsports	Ron Yuhas	Troyer	G&G Electrical Supply, Fastrack Electric, Dell Electric, Lumiere Electrical, Andrew James Interiors, AP Maquardt & Sons, Hugh
73	Paulie Hartwig III	Hartwig Racing	Bobby Geiger Jr	FURY Race Cars	Professional Therapy LLC; Jersey Shore Contracting
79	Jonathan McKennedy	Jonathan McKennedy Racing	Patrick Walsh	FURY Race Cars	Stuarts Automotive, Christopher’s Towing, Hillsboro Ent., Leone’s Corp, Levasseur HVAC
82	Andrew Molleur	DWR Racing	Michael Molleur	LFR	Horton Avenue Materials
95	Cory Plummer	Apex Racing	Jonah Gosnell	Apex Race Cars	Apex Race Cars; Tuckers Fabrication & Welding; Apex Racing; Croteau Machine

Posted on July 15, 2026July 16, 2026 by Zach Sturniolo

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.

MORE: Cup standings | Cup schedule

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.

Posted on July 15, 2026 by Staff Report

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.

MORE: Weekend schedule | How to watch NASCAR on TV

Cup Series
Single-car qualifying will occur at 6:10 p.m. ET on Saturday, with practice at 5 p.m. ET (truTV).

POSITION	NUMBER	DRIVER	METRIC	GROUP
1	66	* Chad Finchum(i)	34.5	1
2	51	Cody Ware	33.2	1
3	16	AJ Allmendinger	32.5	1
4	35	Riley Herbst	32.0	1
5	33	Austin Hill(i)	30.7	1
6	88	Connor Zilisch #	30.1	1
7	4	Noah Gragson	28.2	1
8	19	Chase Briscoe	28.2	1
9	38	Zane Smith	27.9	1
10	21	Josh Berry	27.7	1
11	5	Kyle Larson	25.6	1
12	23	Bubba Wallace	24.2	1
13	48	Alex Bowman	24.1	1
14	47	Ricky Stenhouse Jr.	23.9	1
15	6	Brad Keselowski	23.9	1
16	10	Ty Dillon	23.6	1
17	60	Ryan Preece	21.9	1
18	41	Cole Custer	21.8	1
19	42	John Hunter Nemechek	20.7	1
20	34	Todd Gilliland	20.5	2
21	7	Daniel Suárez	18.0	2
22	71	Michael McDowell	16.8	2
23	24	William Byron	14.8	2
24	2	Austin Cindric	14.0	2
25	1	Ross Chastain	13.7	2
26	3	Austin Dillon	13.3	2
27	22	Joey Logano	11.7	2
28	9	Chase Elliott	10.6	2
29	17	Chris Buescher	9.1	2
30	97	Shane van Gisbergen	8.7	2
31	11	Denny Hamlin	8.7	2
32	43	Erik Jones	8.3	2
33	45	Tyler Reddick	6.2	2
34	77	Carson Hocevar	4.5	2
35	20	Christopher Bell	4.1	2
36	54	Ty Gibbs	4.0	2
37	12	Ryan Blaney	1.6	2

Craftsman Truck Series
Single-truck qualifying will occur at 3:05 p.m. ET on Friday, with practice at 2 p.m. ET (FS2).

POSITION	NUMBER	DRIVER	METRIC
1	27	Kasey Kleyn	40.7
2	75	Landon Huffman	40.4
3	56	Timmy Hill	39.8
4	71	Shane van Gisbergen(i)	39.2
5	4	Donovan Strauss	38.3
6	42	Tyler Reif	30.6
7	22	Clayton Green	29.1
8	33	Frankie Muniz	27.2
9	10	Corey LaJoie	26.5
10	88	Ty Majeski	25.7
11	99	Ben Rhodes	25.3
12	14	Mini Tyrrell	24.9
13	76	Nathan Nicholson	24.0
14	38	Chandler Smith	22.8
15	18	Tyler Ankrum	22.0
16	1	Nick Leitz	21.2
17	98	Jake Garcia	20.8
18	81	Kris Wright	20.6
19	2	Luke Baldwin	19.0
20	26	Dawson Sutton	18.3
21	5	Corey Heim	18.1
22	17	Gio Ruggiero	16.4
23	34	Layne Riggs	16.4
24	13	Cole Butcher	16.1
25	16	Justin Haley	16.1
26	25	Ryan Newman	14.2
27	62	Christopher Bell(i)	14.2
28	12	Brenden Queen	14.1
29	7	Chase Elliott(i)	13.8
30	15	Tanner Gray	12.2
31	52	Stewart Freisen	11.4
32	44	Andrés Pérez	10.9
33	19	Daniel Hemric	8.1
34	91	Christian Eckes	5.6
35	77	Carson Hocevar(i)	5.5
36	9	Grant Enfinger	4.9
37	45	Landen Lewis	2.9
38	11	Kaden Honeycutt	2.7

* Required to qualify on time
# denotes series rookie
(i) denotes ineligible for driver points

Posted on July 15, 2026July 15, 2026 by Pat DeCola

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.

RELATED: Bell through the years

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.

Posted on July 14, 2026July 15, 2026 by Nate Ryan

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.”

Thunder in the Mountains 200

White Mountain Motorsports Park

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: