The NASCAR postseason is exceptionally long. With 10 races in 10 weeks and 16 drivers racing for the championship in the Chase, one race won’t be the deciding factor in who is holding up the Bill France Cup at season’s end.
But boy, does winning the first Chase race sure seem to be an advantage.
The first race of the postseason has been held at Darlington Raceway since 2020 — excluding 2024 — as if the crown jewel event that is the Southern 500 needed any more stakes.
What history says about winning the first Chase race
In the five years that the Southern 500 has been the opening race of NASCAR’s postseason, four drivers in championship contention have won it, the lone outlier being Erik Jones in 2022.
Of those four, the only driver not to make it to the Championship 4 was Kevin Harvick in 2020. Harvick was stunningly eliminated in the Round of 8 after a nine-win campaign.
However, Denny Hamlin in 2021, Kyle Larson in 2023 and Chase Briscoe, the two-time defending Southern 500 winner, in 2025, all won the Southern 500 to open the postseason and went on to make the Championship 4.
In 2024, the opening race of the playoffs was held at Atlanta. The winner of that race, Joey Logano, went on to win the championship. He’s one of only two drivers to win the championship after winning the opening race of the postseason over the last decade, as Martin Truex Jr. in 2017 is the only other driver to accomplish the feat.
In the first iteration of the Chase, several other drivers won the title after winning the first race of the 10-race postseason. Brad Keselowski in 2012, Tony Stewart in 2011 and Kurt Busch in 2004 all won the first Chase race before winning the title at year’s end.
While only five drivers have won both the first race of the postseason and the championship, a win on Sunday at Darlington for any of the 16 championship hopefuls would be, at the very least, a shot in the arm.
At the most, it’s a monumental crown jewel victory that could propel them all the way to a Cup Series crown.