Consistency, consistency, consistency.
That was the theme when it came to arguing for the removal of the old "win and in" playoff format from the NASCAR Cup Series, the format that had been in place since 2014.
So when NASCAR reverted to an iteration of the old 10-race "Chase" format, it was said that consistency would once again be valued.
To the obvious extent, it is; you're no longer going to see a last-place driver in points get into the 16-race playoff field simply by winning a superspeedway race, which is exactly what happened two years ago with Harrison Burton at Daytona International Speedway.
But the idea that consistency solves everything is still a myth, and not just because of the fact that NASCAR decided, to make up for the removal of "win and in", to give race winners 15 bonus points.
RFK Racing's Ryan Preece highlighted the series' consistency conundrum early on. He was consistent, and it was enough to get him solidly inside the provisional playoff picture.
But he wasn't consistently good.
Through the season's first 12 points races, he was eighth in points based on finishes (excluding stage points). He was ninth based on total points scored (but scored 13th due to a 25-point penalty).
Yet he hadn't actually finished a single race higher than eighth place all season, and he had just one other top 10 finish.
His "consistency" came in the form of an 11-race stretch of top 18 finishes, and the fact that he hadn't finished lower than 25th all year.
Consistency matters. But that kind of consistency, for as good as it looked on paper and even in the standings, was not even remotely sustainable. Fragile would be a much better way to describe it.
Preece was knocked out of Charlotte Motor Speedway's Coca-Cola 600 in a wreck, and he was knocked out of Nashville Superspeedway's Cracker Barrel 400 on Sunday night with radiator issues in the No. 60 Ford.
That's two DNFs for a driver who had been fortunate not to suffer any in the season's first 12 races. And just like that, he's dropped out of the top 16 in the point standings entirely.
In other words, had he had even an ounce of misfortune during that streak of "consistency", he wouldn't have been in a playoff spot to begin with. Because he was never consistently good.
A 13.83 average finish is undoubtedly respectable. But with no DNFs, it was never, ever going to last without at least an occasional top three or top five run.
It took no time at all for two DNFs to expose that. All of a sudden, it's 16.86, and he's 17th in points, two points below the cut line.
One could argue that a 16-driver playoff field is still too big. But even at 16 drivers, it only rewards consistency to a certain degree. It does not inherently reward mediocrity. It does not inherently reward riding around avoiding wrecks better than everybody else.
The case of Preece is perhaps the best way to illustrate that.
Race number 15 on the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series regular season schedule is the FireKeepers Casino 400, which is set to be shown live on Amazon Prime Video from Michigan International Speedway beginning at 3:00 p.m. ET on Sunday, June 7. Don't miss any of the action from the series' only 2.0-mile oval!
Add us as a preferred source on Google