![\"NASCAR](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/725f7db3-7033-4d19-b411-48d5a2b377d2.jpeg\" "\\"NASCAR")
Jonathan Bachman\/\/Getty Images<\/p>\nBefore the start of the NASCAR Cup Series season, former champion Chase Elliott was asked how changes in the way drivers would qualify for the Chase and a shot at the championship might impact the look of the playoff field.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s going to be the same crowd as it\u2019s always been,\u201d Elliott said. \u201cIt\u2019s just going to be who can put together the best 10 weeks as a collective team. There will be six or seven teams probably that have a legitimate chance of winning\u2014the ones that can really, really hit the solid base hits for 10 weeks straight.\u201d<\/p>\n
The same crowd? Largely.<\/p>\n
When the playoffs begin Sunday at Darlington Raceway, the sport\u2019s so-called superteams\u2014Joe Gibbs Racing, Team Penske, and Hendrick Motorsports\u2014will be front and center. JGR put all four of its drivers in the field, and Penske is three-for-three. Hendrick has three drivers in the hunt, with only Alex Bowman, who missed several races, out of the picture.<\/p>\n
Jonathan Bachman\/\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
Team Penske drivers Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney leading the field at Richmond earlier this month.<\/p>\n
That gives the series\u2019 top dogs 10 of the 16 Chase spots, including eight of the top nine in the revamped point standings. To underline Elliott\u2019s point, the sport\u2019s new champion is likely to come from that group. Chris Buescher, the 10th-place driver, is 70 points behind top seed Denny Hamlin as the Chase opens, and that\u2019s a tall climb. Throughout the season, the consensus in the garage has been that the champion likely will come from the top five.<\/p>\n
If that thought holds true, the new champion could be very new. Ryan Blaney, who opens the playoffs in second place, is the only driver in the top five with a previous title. Denny Hamlin, the top seed, famously has chased a championship without success his entire career. Others in the top five seeking a first title are Tyler Reddick, Ty Gibbs, and Chase Briscoe.<\/p>\n
Hamlin and Reddick each had hot streaks during the regular season, Hamlin scoring four wins and Reddick five. No other driver won more than three.<\/p>\n
Outside the top five, the best challenges might come from Elliott, starting eighth, and Joey Logano, who\u2019s ninth.<\/p>\n
If momentum means anything (and most would argue that it can\u2019t be sustained from one week to the next), Ryan Preece could shine. His spectacular win Saturday night in Daytona Beach finally put him in the Cup victory column\u2014one short of his 250th career start\u2014and pushed him into the final Chase spot.<\/p>\n
![\"NASCAR](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1fc5ed6a-3b4c-4464-a1fe-729ac5912087.jpeg\" "\\"NASCAR")
James Gilbert\/\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
Chase Elliott (left), Kyle Larson (center) and WIlliam Byron drive for Hendrick Motorsports.<\/p>\n
Hamlin, who plans to drive only one more season after this one, opens the Chase with a 25-point lead and could pad that at Darlington, where he races with a remarkable sense of comfort and has won five times.<\/p>\n
Of course, Darlington presents challenges unlike any other track, and crashes could scramble the playoff standings at the outset.<\/p>\n
Notably, six of the 16 playoff drivers haven\u2019t won this season, opening the door for that always-ominous cloud of NASCAR possibly crowning a seasonal champion with no race wins.<\/p>\n
The \u201cnew\u201d season begins Sunday.<\/p>\n
Stay tuned.\n<\/p>\n
![\"Lettermark\"](\"https:\/\/www.autoweek.com\/_assets\/design-tokens\/autoweek\/static\/images\/logos\/lettermark.de67f45.svg?primary=%2523000\")
<\/p>\n
Mike Hembree has covered auto racing for numerous media outlets, including USA Today, NASCAR Scene, NBC Sports, The Greenville News and the SPEED Channel. He has been roaming garage areas and pit roads for decades (although the persistent rumor that he covered the first Indianapolis 500 is not true). Winner of numerous motorsports and other media awards, he also has covered virtually every other major sport. He lives near Gaffney, South Carolina and can be convinced to attend Bruce Springsteen concerts if you have tickets.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Before the start of the NASCAR Cup Series season, former champion Chase Elliott was asked how changes in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":878481,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[446],"tags":[49,48,782,304870,784,237154,1642,634,304869,273948,82,183339],"class_list":["post-878480","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nascar","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-content-type-news","tag-contentid-f7805edd-fc81-47d8-a14e-24b26042454a","tag-displaytype-standard-article","tag-issyndicated-false","tag-locale-us","tag-nascar","tag-shorttitle-nascars-superteams-dominate-the-chase","tag-sponsored-false","tag-sports","tag-subsection-nascar"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/878480","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=878480"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/878480\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/878481"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=878480"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=878480"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=878480"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}