Photo by Sean Gardner/Getty Images By Adam Carabine The StatChat Power Rankings return in 2026! While finishing position is important, it’s not always indicative of the full picture. StatChat rankings are determined using a large number of statistical inputs. Let's look at the Top 10: Chase Briscoe – This week: 10 – Last week: 9 Briscoe has struggled a bit on road courses in the Cup Series, considering what success he had on them in the O’Reilly Auto Parts (Xfinity at the

Photo by James Gilbert/Getty Images By Adam Carabine Though it was in a slightly different capacity, Denny Hamlin returned to Victory Lane for the fourth week in a row. Hamlin, one of the co-owners of 23XI Racing, was celebrating this weekend as a boss, rather than as a driver, as part-time entrant Corey Heim earned his first ever Cup Series victory at the Coronado Street Course in San Diego! Let’s have a look at how it all shook down! Lap 1: Green flag – to the surpris

By Adam Carabine Happy weekend everyone, it’s time for another edition of Stats Saturday. This weekend the Cup Series travels to San Diego, California for the Anduril 250 Race the Base at the Coronado Street Course, also known as the Qualcomm Circuit. This is the first year that NASCAR has done this race, and it is a brand-new track that is being built for this event. The circuit is planned to be 3.4 miles long, featuring 19 turns. Since this is the first event here, the

By Adam Carabine Happy weekend everyone, it’s time for another edition of O’Reilly Stats Friday. This weekend the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series travels to San Diego, California for the United Rentals Driven to Serve 250 at the Coronado Street Course, also known as the Qualcomm Circuit. This is the first year that NASCAR has done this race, and it is a brand-new track that is being built for this event. The circuit is planned to be 3.4 miles long, featuring 19 turns. Since th

By Adam Carabine Happy weekend everyone, you might be familiar with the Cup Series’ Stats Saturday article, but this year we are branching it out to the Top 3 Series. It’s now time for another Truck Stats Thursday. This weekend the Craftsman Truck Series travels to San Diego, California for the Navy 250 at the Coronado Street Course, also known as the Qualcomm Circuit. This is the first year that NASCAR has done this race, and it is a brand-new track that is being built fo

Photo by David Jensen/Getty Images By Adam Carabine The StatChat Power Rankings return in 2026! While finishing position is important, it’s not always indicative of the full picture. StatChat rankings are determined using a large number of statistical inputs. Let's look at the Top 10: Erik Jones – This week: 10 – Last week: 11 Erik Jones and Legacy Motor Club have been really improving these last few weeks. Jones has an average finish of just over 10th in the last five ra

Photo by James Gilbert/Getty Images By Adam Carabine Is this déjà vu? (we said that last week too). For the third week in a row, Denny Hamlin has won the race from the pole! This week, it was a little less complicated for him, as he didn’t have to go to the rear early in the race. Let’s have a look at how it all shook down! Lap 1: Denny Hamlin on pole, Kyle Larson beside him, the race is green! Larson takes the lead from Hamlin by Turn 2. Lap 2: Daniel Suarez gets

By Adam Carabine Happy weekend everyone, it’s time for another edition of Stats Saturday. This weekend the Cup Series travels to Long Pond, Pennsylvania for the Great American Getaway 400 at Pocono Raceway. Pocono is a unique triangle-shaped track that only has three corners rather than the traditional four. It is 2.5 miles long, and features three distinctly different corners, each modelled after other race tracks. Turn One is modelled after Trenton Speedway, Turn Two is

By Adam Carabine Happy weekend everyone, it’s time for another edition of O’Reilly Stats Friday. This weekend the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series travels to Kansas City, Kansas for the Kansas Lottery 300 at Kansas Speedway. Kansas is a 1.5-mile tri-oval speedway, built in 2001. Jeff Green won the first O’Reilly Series race there that same year. Brandon Jones won the most recent race at Kansas last year. Tomorrow’s race will be 200 laps long (for a total of 300 miles), with s

Photo by Sean Gardner/Getty Images By Adam Carabine The StatChat Power Rankings return in 2026! While finishing position is important, it’s not always indicative of the full picture. StatChat rankings are determined using a large number of statistical inputs. Let's look at the Top 10: Chase Briscoe – This week: 10 – Last week: 11 It felt like Briscoe was barely on the TV broadcast on Sunday in Michigan, though to be fair, there were a lot of things happening all at once.

Photo by Brett Farmer/Getty Images By Adam Carabine Is this déjà vu? Denny Hamlin won the pole, went to the rear, and then drove all the way to the front for the second week in a row. There was a lot of crashing and carnage at Michigan, but Denny rose above it to capture the win. Let’s have a look at how it all shook down! Lap 1: Denny Hamlin should have been on pole, but had to make repairs to his car, so he had to start at the rear. Carson Hocevar became the contro

Photo by David Jensen/Getty Images By Adam Carabine The StatChat Power Rankings return in 2026! While finishing position is important, it’s not always indicative of the full picture. StatChat rankings are determined using a large number of statistical inputs. Let's look at the Top 10: Daniel Suarez – This week: 10 – Last week: 13 Riding some momentum from last week’s win at the Coca-Cola 600, Suarez started near the front and had some solid moments at Nashville. He faded

Photo by Sean Gardner/Getty Images By Adam Carabine A chaotic four-lap shootout, multiple brake rotor failures, and an interesting penalty at the start of the race – all of which Denny Hamlin overcame and earned his 62nd Career Cup Series win at Nashville! Let’s have a look at how it all shook down! Pre-Race: The start was delayed due to some light showers in the area. Once they got the track dry, NASCAR opted to include a Competition Caution at (or around) Lap 35. La

Photo by Sean Gardner/Getty Images By Adam Carabine The StatChat Power Rankings return in 2026! While finishing position is important, it’s not always indicative of the full picture. StatChat rankings are determined using a large number of statistical inputs. Let's look at the Top 10: Ty Gibbs – This week: 10 – Last week: 10 It was a solid day at the track for Ty Gibbs at Watkins Glen. Unfortunately, no one was a match for SVG and his road course prowess, but Gibbs led a

Photo by Sean Gardner/Getty Images By Adam Carabine Shane Van Gisbergen showed why he is the absolute road course GOAT, and made up a 29-second gap to win for the second year in a row! Let’s have a look at how it all shook down! Lap 1: Shane Van Gisbergen starts on the pole, with Michael McDowell next to him. SVG takes the lead off the start, though McDowell keeps pace pretty well. Lap 9: SVG’s lead over McDowell is now up to 2 seconds, Connor Zilisch is in third,

By Adam Carabine Welcome to the StatChat NASCAR Games! If you’re new here, this year I thought it might be fun to share some of the silly little games I play on my NASCAR Excel Sheet throughout the season as we follow along. BRACKET GAMES These games are similar to NASCAR’s In-Season Tournament, as created by Denny Hamlin, but my version lasts all season long. Drivers are originally seeded by a mixture of performance from last year, with some creative discretion from m

Photo by David Jensen/Getty Images By Adam Carabine The StatChat Power Rankings return in 2026! While finishing position is important, it’s not always indicative of the full picture. StatChat rankings are determined using a large number of statistical inputs. Let's look at the Top 10: Ty Gibbs – This week: 10 – Last week: 6 It was a rough week at the track for Ty Gibbs in Texas. While the driver is still buoyed up into the Top 10 by his first career win a few weeks ago, h

Photo by Logan Riely/Getty Images By Adam Carabine It wasn’t exactly the cleanest day at the track on Sunday in Texas, but you won’t hear many complaints from Chase Elliott, as he scooped up his second win of this 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season. Let’s have a look at how it all shook down! Lap 1: Last week’s winner, Carson Hocevar, is on the pole. He’s next to his Spire Motorsports teammate Daniel Suarez. Lap 10: Hocevar’s lead is already up to 1.6 seconds. Lap 19:

Photo by Sean Gardner/Getty Images By Adam Carabine It was a dominant day on the track for Denny Hamlin, but some major late-race drama (including a crazy final caution) led to Tyler Reddick earning his 5 th win of the season! Let’s have a look at how it all shook down! Lap 1: Pole-sitter Tyler Reddick takes the green flag alongside Denny Hamlin. As they fight back and forth all lap long, it’s a drag race back to the start-finish line. Hamlin edges out in front and t

By Adam Carabine Happy weekend everyone, it’s time for another edition of Stats Saturday. This weekend the Cup Series travels to Kansas City, Kansas for the Advent Health 400 at Kansas Speedway. Kansas is a 1.5-mile tri-oval speedway, built in 2001. Jeff Gordon won the first Cup Series race there that same year. Kyle Larson won this race in the spring last year, and Chase Elliott won it in the fall. Tomorrow’s race will be 267 laps long (for a total of 400.5 miles), wit