Just past halfway through the 2023 NASCAR season, the NASCAR Fan Council has completed their mid-season survey. And the results are…odd to say the least. The survey itself focused on four things primarily: Playoff Predictions, Championship Favorites, Favorite Cup Series Races So Far, and Remaining Races Most Looked Forward To. Well, the results are in! Let’s talk about them.
Okay, the way the Playoffs Predictions are listed here is inherently flawed. Here, we have a list of drivers with a percentage of the possibility of them making the playoffs based on fan opinion. What’s wrong with that is, for example, Kyle Busch, according to this graphic, has a 97% chance of making the 2023 NASCAR Playoffs. He has 3 wins so far on the season, tied with William Byron for most in the series so far. That means that 3% of the fans do not think it is likely that Busch makes the postseason. That’s absurd. At the moment, Kyle Busch sits fifth in the overall point standings. Not absolutely incredible but, the way NASCAR’s Playoffs are formatted, if a driver has multiple wins, especially 3+ on the season, they’re locked into the postseason, full-stop. It’s not really up for a debate and, I hate to break it to you, this is not 2022. The drivers have a better understanding of the NextGen car and we’re not going to have as much parity this year as we had last year. It’s just not going to happen.
So, if we’re being super realistic about it, all drivers with multiple wins should have a 100% chance of making the Playoffs. That’s Kyle Busch (3 wins), William Byron (3 wins), Martin Truex Jr. (2), and Kyle Larson (2). Those are the top-4 drivers on the season and they’re all locks for the postseason.
Next, the one-time winners so far on the season who have run a little more consistent have a 99% of making the post season. These drivers are Ross Chastain, Christopher Bell, Denny Hamlin, and Ryan Blaney. Blaney has been easily the most consistent Team Penske driver so far this year. Next are the inconsistent drivers with 1 win: Joey Logano, Tyler Reddick, and 2023 Daytona 500 champion, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. I’d say they all have a 98.9% chance of making the playoffs. On the year, we have 11 different winners. That leaves over 5 spots at the tail end of the playoff field. So, it’s not completely out of the question that things might get a little dicey around 15th or 16th in points, but the odds of it happening are slim to none. These inconsistent winners still have an excellent shot to make the postseason. It’s even very, very likely.
TheRealCeeser00 questions why on earth only 60% of voters think Stenhouse will get into the postseason. Yeah, as stated before, that’s a very, very low percentage. SoothedSnakePlant points out that it is still mathematically possible to get 17 winners on the season. But is it likely? Not with the year we’re having so far.
Rocketman1555 can’t believe the number of people saying that Bowman will get in over Reddick. Yeah, that’s a bit insane. Reddick is a winner this season while Bowman has been consistently inconsistent. Go figure. Into_the_wenisverse points out that it’s all a popularity contest. There is work that tends to show that.
Thi31 points out that the survey takers must not understand how the playoffs in NASCAR work. I think that’s a fair criticism.
Yeah, jlenny68, yeah, that’s not how the system works, is it?
Another aspect of the 2023 season the survey took a gander at was the fans favorite races through the season so far and what races fans are most looking forward to. Let’s first take a look at the top-5 races so far:
Now, if we were looking at strictly TV ratings, I could totally see this being the ranking. Or, at least something that looks kind of like it. The Daytona 500 is almost always the most watched race of the season and, the Coke 600 taking place on a holiday weekend and being on the crown jewels, I could see it not being too far behind.
As for the All-Star Race at North Wilkesboro, there was a lot of hype around it. Fans were excited to see NASCAR return to their roots. The truck race on Saturday was fantastic. I’m not denying that at all. But we’re talking about CUP races here. And…the All-Star Race left a lot to be desired.
The same thing goes with a lot of the superspeedway races these days. The NextGen cars and the packages NASCAR uses at short tracks and superspeedways do not blend well. At the former, it’s so hard to pass that there’s a lack of comers and goers. Once Kyle Larson got the lead at North Wilkesboro, he was gone, baby, gone. Meanwhile at the latter, it’s essentially train racing around the top until its nonstop, nonsensical crashing at the end for an absurd unlimited amount of GWC’s.
I don’t remember much about Kansas so maybe that alone means it doesn’t deserve to be on this list. But, giving it the benefit of the doubt, with how the intermediate package has seemed to help those kinds of tracks, maybe it was good. Fine, at the very least and that’s more that can be said for four of the five races on this list.
Then, of course, there is the outlier. The Coca-Cola 600, 2023 edition, was a great race. I mean, it had its obstacles but you’d be hard pressed to find any race this year that hasn’t had some sort of rain and/or lightning delay. For being run on a Monday, the ratings were pretty darn good and it saw a very deserving winner snap his winless drought in Ryan Blaney. I’ll give them that one.
For the tracks fans are looking forward to the most, let’s run through them real quick:
Again, the superspeedways are on there. I suspect that they’ll be much of the same. Bristol Night, I’m partial to. I’ll be going to it and it’s my home track but don’t expect great racing out of it. It’ll be impossible to pass just like all the other short tracks so far in the NextGen era. Darlington’s my favorite track and the Southern 500 is a crown jewel so, yeah, I agree with that.
The Roval as a gimmick has run its course in the eyes of many, if not most, NASCAR fans…which brings into question who this council really is. With how great the Coke 600 in both 2022 and ’23 were, many fans and NASCAR influencers, like Dale Earnhardt Jr., have called for them to go back to the oval for the fall event. Honestly, I wouldn’t hate that decision.
NASCAR142002 says that the superspeedway package will never change now with how they have dominated this listing. Man, I hope that’s not true.
Joshjarnagin says that the fans didn’t witness the same races they did. I don’t know, maybe it was better on TV? No, wait, I watched them and they weren’t.
The Sky is Bloo argues that Wilkesboro was a great race, the field just got spanked by the No. 5 team. No, it wasn’t. Because, if a driver was up front but got screwed because of a slow pitstop, they didn’t just race their way back to the front. They were more-or-less stuck. The ONLY team that was able to do that was that No. 5 bunch, which makes them exceptional…but not the rule.
Moppyploppy and Eliott_fan_9 can’t understand the appeal of ‘Dega and Wilkesboro. They’re not alone.
48for8 says that the short track package being as bad as it is has hidden some of the flaws in the plate package. Hmm…perhaps that is true?
Nathan92299 is concerned about the NASCAR Fan Council, citing the top-5 favorite races as the biggest concern.
WheedMBoise states that we need to do a better job at representing the fan base. I agree, I agree.
Newyorker38 says to replace Wilkesboro with Dover, move the 500 down, and replace ‘Dega with Auto Club. Auto Club was a great race…for two years in a row. Wow, did I really just say that? INSANE!
When it come to championship prediction, it’s impossible to predict anymore. You can predict your top-5 favorites or even the Championship 4 but, when they roll into Phoenix, it’s usually a crapshoot. Here are the top-3, according to the Fan Council:
Pointing out the obvious here, while 3% of the Fan Council don’t have Kyle Busch on their playoff grid at all, a 25% plurality of them have him crowned as champion. Well, at least the two drivers who have won the most on the season so far made the top-3. Kyle Larson has done well this year, despite him being relatively checkers or wreckers. Again, the championship these days is impossible to predict so I’ll leave it at that. These picks aren’t awful.
Crypto6g states that the Fan Council should be the sole authority on who become the champion. Clearly, they’re a Kyle Busch fan and that’s cool. AneeshVegi94 says that that is the only reasonable outcome. I agree.
My point exactly being reiterated from SuperMarioBrother64: it’s impossible to predict a champion anymore.
What do you think, NASCAR fans? Should the NASCAR Fan Council be considered a sort of authority? What do you think of these results? Let us know!
EchoPark Speedway, or Atlanta Motor Speedway, is often touted as the most exciting track on the NASCAR circuit. What was first seen as a Frankenstein experiment, Marcus Smith’s idea to turn AMS into a baby Daytona worked out in the end. We’ve gotten great race after great race and tonight was no different as fans saw Tyler Reddick power by Carson Hocevar to go two in a row to start the season.
But not everyone had a season to remember. Many drivers and teams had a season that they’d sooner forget. These are the biggest losers of the 2026 EchoPark Speedway racing weekend.
The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race officials rightly got blasted online by fans after they made the extremely questionable decision to put the Truck race on Saturday on the weather clock. That would have been an understandable move if circumstances were different. But they caught flak because 1.) EchoPark Speedway has lights, 2.) the weather had moved out for the weekend, and 3.)…umm…they were only 10 laps shy from the scheduled distance anyway.
Now, we know who the defenders are. The O’Reilly Auto Parts Series Race was slated to follow, but NASCAR has pushed races off in the past. And really, how much time would the CW have lost? Ten minutes? Twenty? If that? That, in my book, makes the NCTS officials some of the biggest losers on the weekend. They owe us fans ten more measly laps for racing!
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Of any driver currently in the Chevy ranks, none has had the support thrown behind them like Corey Day. Day, a protege of proven NASCAR champion Kyle Larson, apparently has turned some heads on the dirt scene. Makes sense, since Larson himself said that he’d rather win the Chili Bowl than the Daytona 500. But unlike other drivers, such as Connor Zilisch, who have excelled in other racing disciplines outside of NASCAR, Day’s career so far has been lukewarm at best. And his race yesterday was the epitome of a rookie race, ladened with senseless mistakes.
The incident that hurt the most was the one where he wrecked his fellow HMS/JRM teammates, Carson Kvapil and Justin Allgaier. He simply just took them out while racing for the race lead. Though he was, somehow, able to rebound to finish the race in the 4th position, yesterday was a sloppy performance that even Corey himself acknowledges that he’d rather put behind him.
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Chastain did it again! And now, the feelings are mixed. Remember when Ross Chastain used to just send drivers willy-nilly, and it really got on fans’ nerves? Well, thankfully, he’s calmed down in recent years and has become a more respectable veteran of the sport. That is not to say that he still doesn’t have his…moments. Saturday night at the O’Reilly Auto Parts race, Ross Chastain, going for the win, entered turn 1 and sent leader Austin Hill.
Hill was the overwhelming favorite to win this race, and fans have grown sick of him. So, really, this was a welcome return to form for Chastain, a version of him that used to be loathed by fans. Thus, while fans might have won out by Chastain doing what he does best and slaying Austin Hill, the RCR team, and really, anyone who has Chastain in their rearview mirror in the closing laps, are the real losers this weekend.
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There were a couple of drivers who ended 2025 on a sour note and were looking to turn things around and start 2026 strong. One of those has to be Josh Berry and his entire Wood Brothers team. After floundering around with Harrison Burton for a few seasons, the No. 21 Wood Brothers Ford got the shot in the arm that they needed with a new crew chief and Josh Berry as their new driver. They led a bunch of laps at Atlanta in 2025, only for a wreck with 10 laps to go to take them out of contention. Not to worry, though: they followed it up with a win at Las Vegas.
But since that win, the team suffered a steep decline heading into the summer months. By the time the postseason rolled around, they had the single worst Playoff performance in history with three straight last-place finishes. Though he had a promising start to the season with a 9th-place run in the Daytona 500, it was the same old same old tonight. Berry showed some speed in the first stage but ultimately crashed after Christopher Bell forced the issue in the beginning of Stage 2. It’s a familiar routine for the Wood Brothers. Yet another last-place finish. That makes them one of the biggest losers of the weekend. If only they could have capitalized.
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This one’s a tired subject, so I won’t dwell on it too long. Kyle Busch’s late career decline at Richard Childress Racing should be studied. Though he showed speed early on, it was yet again a single-car spin that ended his day prematurely. Granted, he didn’t spin completely on his own. He was tagged from behind by Noah Gragson. But, that was after he checked up twice and recklessly pulled up in front of him in a hole that was barely there. Yet another disappointing outing for Rowdy Nation.
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The checkered flag has flown in the second race of the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series Season. And, at the end of the day, it was Tyler Reddick who went back-to-back to win at EchoPark Speedway. Tonight, Reddick became the sixth NASCAR Cup Series driver to win the first two races of the season. He is the first since NASCAR Hall of Famer Matt Kenseth did it to kick off the 2009 season.
But, of course, Reddick wasn’t the only one to have a great start to the season. Several drivers leave Atlanta with a great points day, including Carson Hocevar, Bubba Wallace, William Byron, and Ryan Blaney. Here are the highlights of tonight’s race:
From an awful showing in the 2025 Playoffs to yet another last-place finish, Josh Berry’s 2026 season is off to a rough start. Today, he got together with Ty Gibbs after Gibbs had an awful start to the year last year. The No. 54 was able to turn it around later in the season, though. But, for their 2026 outing, there’s a lot left to be desired. Check it out.
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Kyle Busch’s 2025 season was abysmal. But, after he put his No. 8 RCR Chevy on the pole for the 2026 Daytona 500, things seemed to be looking up. He smartly survived last week by lying back on the last lap and safely navigating through the crash, finishing 15th. And he was a contender early in this race. However, late, Kyle Busch continued his dismal legacy at RCR by spinning after contact with Noah Gragson. His day ended prematurely. Check it out:
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We got our first big crash of the race at Lap 224 when both Denny Hamlin and Joey Logano got loose in front of the field. You can read all about that incident with the link below:
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Things started to get real for the NASCAR Cup Series drivers as we got inside 40 laps to go. We got our first Big One of the afternoon at Lap 224. It was triggered as the field came out of Turn 4 and entered the dogleg. Joey Logano and Denny Hamlin, both whose cars were upset by the dirty air, got together. Logano was able to scoot on virtually unscathed. However, Hamlin turned in front of the pack, collecting several stars and heavy hitters. Here’s what happened:
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