Team Penske continued its summer surge at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, as Ryan Blaney won his third race of the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season and gave the storied organization its fourth victory in the six most recent races.
While Denny Hamlin's seventh place finish was enough to knock out Blaney and the rest of his competitors for the regular season championship and the No. 1 seed entering the 10-race Chase postseason, there are still three playoff spots up for grabs as drivers head to Daytona International Speedway for the regular season finale on Saturday night.
Bubba Wallace (+75), Austin Cindric (+44), and Shane van Gisbergen (+31) are currently on the right side of the cut line over Ryan Preece (-31) and Brad Keselowski (-66). Wallace is effectively locked into the Chase with his advantage, but Cindric and van Gisbergen cannot afford to slip up with far less breathing room.
Even though Preece and Keselowski are the only two drivers outside the provisional Chase field who can still race their way in, the drama is still palpable as the "World Center of Racing" plays host to 400 miles of close-quarters racing under the lights with several drivers' seasons on the line.
Sure, the elimination of "win and in" from the playoff format keeps the rest of the field from being able to pick up that walk-off win to advance to race for a championship, and it has also currently set the stage for every driver who has won a race this season to make the Chase anyway. That said, this is still Daytona with a field full of hungry drivers looking to establish some momentum late in the season.
Daytona set to bring more chaos before the Chase begins
Even with a new format in place, there is no reason to believe the high banks of Daytona will not produce another dramatic send-off to the regular season on Saturday night. Yes, fuel mileage has dominated superspeedway races lately and even led to NASCAR tweaking the stage lengths for the spring race at Talladega Superspeedway as a result.
With the stagnant two-wide racing and lack of movement throughout the field created by the fuel saving, NASCAR announced a new rules package back in July that will shorten the rear spoiler from seven inches to four in an effort to reduce drag, in addition to a slight reduction in horsepower from 510 to 465 to accommodate the reduced downforce.
The ultimate goal is for drivers to be able to maneuver their way through the field and not be as reluctant to get out of line with the fear that they can't get enough momentum to make the move worth it. Even Hamlin, who was a big advocate for the changes and feels there is "going to be roughly a 33% gain in the right direction," is still expecting some chaos.
"I think this weekend has potential to be absolute (expletive) chaos," Hamlin said on the latest episode of his Actions Detrimental podcast. "What I'm getting in the data I'm seeing from this new package, I think the cars could be far more out of control when they're trying to push each other."
Daytona + this new package = chaos? 👀 pic.twitter.com/n6Xq9cj0GE
— Dirty Mo Media (@DirtyMoMedia) August 25, 2026
With only a single-car qualifying session on Friday and no practice, which has become common any time the series visits the drafting-style tracks of Daytona, Talladega, and Atlanta, the new rules package alone should invoke enough drama before cars even take to the track.
Before Cup Series drivers have their turn, the O'Reilly Auto Parts Series drivers are set to run their regular season finale on Friday night, as Joe Gibbs Racing drivers William Sawalich and Brent Crews hold a one-point lead over teammate Taylor Gray and a 15-point advantage over Rajah Caruth, which could lead to even more desperation and edge-of-your-seat racing over 250 miles.
While many questioned how the revamped Chase format would affect the racing and the drama that was expected from the "win and in" era, a new Cup Series rules package and spots for the taking in both series should still produce a memorable weekend in Daytona Beach.
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