NASCAR still mulling championship format for 2026 and/or beyond
A playoff committee has been assembled, and has met multiple times this year, and is comprised of drivers, Hall of Fame inductees, broadcasters, officials, media members and broadcast executives. It's been a polarizing topic over the past week with every indication pointing towards NASCAR retaining a playoff format of some kind instead of reverting back to a season long points format.
NASCAR's managing director of racing communications, Mike Forde, detailed on Wednesday's episode of his officially sanctioned 'Hauler Talk' podcast about the state of those conversations.
'We're going to have a discussion with our broadcast partners at NBC,' Forde said. 'NBC does have a seat at the table and they have a member of their team [on the playoff committee]. … There are other people at NBC who have a huge voice. Obviously, they are spending a lot of money to broadcast NASCAR. They do have a large seat at the table, so we'll be talking to them and getting their opinions on that. I feel like people have kind of scoffed at that move and have been incredulous that NBC does have such a huge voice — that feels strange to me. I feel like that is a pretty obvious thing that we need to do. They have a big voice because they write the biggest check.
'But once we come upon a menu of options, we do plan to have a fan council survey that goes out to get the fans' point of view. I know Mark Martin has put an X poll out there, Jeff Gluck has put an X poll out there, so we are also going to take a survey of our fans — that's part of our plan anyway.'
Forde said a change won't be made from the status quo unless NASCAR feels very strongly that it is the right thing to do.
'TBD on really when the next step is and if we have enough time to get changes in place for 2026,' Forde said. 'I think that's something we'll work towards but making that happen as we're getting closer to the middle of August to talk to NBC and have a full-blown meeting and the aftermath of what that will be –may be a little bit tricky — but I wouldn't completely rule out 2026 changes, either. … There are really lots of opinions, so I think it's just boiling it down to the top four, getting with NBC, then getting back to the committee and then getting with NASCAR leadership to say here's what it is.
'Now, can we do that in time and feel good about it for 2026? What it comes down to is we don't want to feel like we are pushing through a change that we're going to have to change again. We want to feel really, really good about. If that can happen for 2026, great. If not, I think we're comfortable waiting for 2027.'
The current format is a 16-driver, three round elimination gauntlet that is eventually decided by a one-race best-finisher-take-all finale between a final four. The format heavily rewards winning through advancing into the tournament but also advancing from round-to-round.
Before this format, NASCAR used a 10 (and later 12) driver, 10-race points battle after the regular season in which the participants were the drivers highest in championship points re-seeded based on their regular season running order.
Prior to that was the season long points battle which emphasized average finish over the course of the whole year.
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