{"id":281948,"date":"2025-11-14T05:59:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-14T05:59:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/281948\/"},"modified":"2025-11-14T05:59:09","modified_gmt":"2025-11-14T05:59:09","slug":"nascar-informed-team-executives-that-most-likely-outcome-is-retaining-a-playoff-in-2026-per-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/281948\/","title":{"rendered":"NASCAR informed team executives that most likely outcome is retaining a playoff in 2026, per report"},"content":{"rendered":"

While a final decision has yet to be made, NASCAR<\/a> appears to be leaning towards retaining a playoff in 2026. Per a report from Adam Stern of Sports Business Journal<\/a>, the sanctioning body informed team executives during a meeting before the championship race at Phoenix Raceway that a \u201cplayoff with revisions\u201d is the most likely outcome. <\/p>\n

Other plans are still being studied, Stern noted, such as a return to the full-season points format. Stern\u2019s report comes after Mike Forde,\u00a0NASCAR\u00a0managing director of racing communications, said on Tuesday\u2019s \u201cHauler Talk<\/a>\u201d that\u00a0discussions are still taking place<\/a>\u00a0within NASCAR concerning the future of the championship format. Forde said an announcement as to which format NASCAR uses to determine a champion in 2026 and beyond could come in \u201ctwo weeks, it could be in two months.\u201d All of it is still to be determined.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re going to take all the feedback they got from every walk of life and every thought on the spectrum from no playoffs whatsoever to keeping it how it is and really beating that all up. They\u2019re announcements to come,\u201d Forde said. \u201cHonestly, I don\u2019t know where it is. It could be in two weeks, it could be in two months. We clearly want to make sure that we have been very thorough on this one. <\/p>\n

\u201cObviously, it will be before Feb. 5 in The Clash, but it could be sooner than later, it could be in January. I don\u2019t know, I don\u2019t think anyone knows just yet. Still discussions to be had on where we are on discussion of the playoff format. I think we feel good about the directions and the possibilities here because of the playoff committee and the work that they\u2019ve done and the feedback we got from the industry.\u201d<\/p>\n

NASCAR championship format could look different in 2026<\/p>\n

NASCAR introduced the current elimination style format in 2014. The 10-race postseason is capped off by a one-race, winner-take-all finale where the highest finisher of the Championship 4 drivers is crowned champion.<\/p>\n

NASCAR put together a playoff committee consisting of former drivers, media partners, team owners, manufacturers, track representatives and independent media to determine if the format should change in 2026. Some have argued for a return to the full-season points format, while others are in favor of a revamped 10-race Chase.<\/p>\n

An official decision will certainly come before the new season starts in early February, as Forde mentioned. Whichever format wins out, some will be happy, some won\u2019t. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While a final decision has yet to be made, NASCAR appears to be leaning towards retaining a playoff…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":281949,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[446],"tags":[49,48,634,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-281948","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nascar","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-nascar","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281948","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=281948"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281948\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/281949"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=281948"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=281948"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=281948"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}