Joe Gibbs Racing's Denny Hamlin picked up an emotional first win of the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season at the same place he picked up an emotional sixth and final win of the 2025 season on Sunday at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
Hamlin became the 2026 season's third different winner through five races, joining Tyler Reddick, who won the season's first three races for the 23XI Racing team that Hamlin co-owns with Michael Jordan, and Team Penske's Ryan Blaney.
However, under the new NASCAR postseason format, nobody has officially secured any of the 16 "Chase" playoff berths quite yet.
Denny Hamlin not yet locked into NASCAR playoffs
One of the biggest changes to the playoff format over the offseason was the elimination of "win and in". Gone are the days when a driver could effectively secure a berth in the playoffs seven months before they actually started.
Interestingly, even under the old format, Hamlin still wouldn't have locked up a playoff spot with his victory in Sunday's 267-lap Pennzoil 400 around the four-turn, 1.5-mile (2.414-kilometer) Las Vegas, Nevada oval.
With 26 regular season races and 16 playoff spots, it was technically possible for there to be more winners than available spots. So officially, those 16 playoff spots were awarded to the regular season champion, even if he didn't win, and the 15 drivers who ranked highest in wins, with the tiebreaker among single-race winners (or non-winners) being points.
Winning more than once, since there could only be 13 multi-race winners in the regular season, was technically the only way to solidify a playoff spot this early in the season, meaning that Reddick would be the only driver locked in under the previous format; Blaney and Hamlin would still have work to do.
That said, it goes without saying that Reddick, Blaney, and Hamlin are all pretty safe in 2026, barring anything disastrous.
Reddick has been the points leader all year, thanks to the fact that he became the first driver in the 78-year history of the Cup Series to start the season with three consecutive victories, and Blaney and Hamlin find themselves in third and fourth place in the standings, respectively.
Reddick's teammate, Bubba Wallace, is second in the standings. Although he hasn't finished inside the top five, he has not finished lower than 11th and has been efficiently racking up stage points.
Through five races, Reddick, Wallace, Blaney, and Hamlin are 138 points, 77 points, 71 points, and 60 points above the playoff cut line between the 16th place and 17th place drivers.
It is mathematically possible for multiple playoff spots to be secured before August's regular season finale at Daytona International Speedway, but not this early, and not for another few months.
Darlington Raceway is scheduled to host the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season's sixth race this coming Sunday, March 22. The Goodyear 400 is set to be shown live on Fox Sports 1 starting at 3:00 p.m. ET. Start a free trial of FuboTV now and catch all of the action from the "Lady in Black"!