Since the beginning of the 2025 NASCAR season, NASCAR has awarded an extra point to whichever driver has run the fastest single lap in each race. That point, officially the Xfinity Fastest Lap point for sponsorship purposes, was added across all three national series.
Though points didn't matter as much during the knockout playoff era as they are set to matter under the new Chase format in 2026, this still raised some concerns.
One of the main concerns was the fact that, once a driver was out of contention for the win and several laps down with nothing left to race for, he could focus squarely on running the fastest lap to collect that bonus point.
Let's say a driver was running 30th, 50 laps down and slated to score seven points. If that driver were to earn the fastest lap point to bring him to eight points, that fastest lap was effectively worth an extra position – and in this case, 50 entire laps.
Compare that to Formula 1, which actually (and smartly) abolished its fastest lap point after the 2024 season completely. Even when the point existed, a driver needed to be running inside the top 10 at the end of the race for his fastest lap to count in terms of scoring that extra point. And if he wasn't, no extra point was awarded to anybody.
In 2026, NASCAR has smartly changed their approach.
No, they haven't eliminated the fastest lap point entirely, though we'll assume that has something to do with keeping Xfinity happy. But they have adjusted the rules surrounding it.
Now once a car has entered the garage, its driver becomes ineligible to record the fastest lap from that point forward. If he were to come back out and record it, it would not count in terms of scoring the extra point.
However, the driver would still be eligible to score that extra point if he had already run the fastest lap prior to the car going back to the garage, and nobody beats that lap time throughout the rest of the race.
It feels like a fair compromise, which seems like something NASCAR fans have been saying a lot lately, namely about the new championship format that brought an end to the 12-year Championship 4 era.
But it also feels like a measure of common sense that could have and should have been implemented in 2025, back when the fastest lap point was introduced.
Better later than never, I guess.