Getting to the Playoffs is one thing, but staying in it is another altogether. 16 drivers have qualified for the Cup Series postseason at the highest level of the sport by winning or earning the most points, but as the Playoffs continue that all-star list will be whittled down.
The Playoffs are divided into four rounds, three with three races with four drivers eliminated after each round and a final championship race. The first round starts off strong at Atlanta, Watkins Glen, and Bristol – a superspeedway, road course, and short track.
Odds via BetMGM
+1000 – Ryan Blaney
+1100 – Joey Logano
+1200 – Brad Keselowski
+1200 – Kyle Busch
+1300 – Denny Hamlin
+1400 – William Byron
+1400 – Kyle Larson
+1600 – Chase Elliott
+2000 – Chris Buescher
+2200 – Daniel Suarez
It’s the Quaker State 400 at Atlanta Motor Speedway, which airs on Sunday at 3 p.m. ET on USA, PRN, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, that officially begins the postseason and the race for the big trophy.
That’s a challenge. Atlanta races like a superspeedway, and the tight packs and high speeds at those sorts of racetracks makes them unpredictable and takes it out of the drivers’ hands if the field wrecks. A road course drives differently than the rest of the schedule, and Watkins Glen has proven difficult to pass at in recent races. And Bristol is not only well-known for historic bump-, or dump-, and-runs, but earlier this year featured a surprising tire with heavy degradation that forced drivers and teams to adapt on the fly.
“Well, it’s tough,” Denny Hamlin acknowledged of the first round. “When I look at Atlanta, and certainly the road course race that we’ve got in there, and Bristol, you just never know what’s going to happen, and it could definitely lend itself to a top two or three contender going out in the first round.”
Those top drivers Hamlin references take the form of Kyle Larson, Christopher Bell, and Tyler Reddick, all of whom enter with large advantages to the provisional cutline already. Drivers can earn Playoff points throughout the regular season for race wins and stage wins, and for finishing in the top ten in the regular season standings, and those transfer into every round of the Playoffs that the driver advances into apart from the last. So getting more of those is also a goal even in the Playoffs.
Larson, Bell, and Reddick enjoy a 35-point, 27-point, and 23-point buffer to the cutline before the round has even begun. Larson has earned four wins and ten stage wins already this season, Bell has earned three wins and ten stage wins, and Reddick has two wins, three stage wins, and the regular season championship to his credit.
Behind those three, William Byron (+17), defending champion Ryan Blaney (+13), Denny Hamlin (+10), Chase Elliott (+9), Brad Keselowski (+3), Joey Logano (+2), Austin Cindric (+2), and Daniel Suarez (+1) enter above the cutline by some margin, though their advantage is slimmer.
Also entering above the cutline is Alex Bowman, but by zero points. He holds the tiebreaker over both Chase Briscoe and Harrison Burton, who also have the same point total. The tiebreaker is based on best finishes – while all three of those drivers have wins and both Bowman and Briscoe have finished second once this season, Bowman’s third-place finish at Pocono breaks the tie.
Behind them, Ty Gibbs and Martin Truex both trail the cutline by one point as they enter. Both Ty Gibbs – who qualified for his first-ever Playoffs in his sophomore season – and Martin Truex – who qualified again for the Playoffs in his final full-time season – were the only two drivers to earn a postseason spot without a win and on the back of the points they accrued throughout the regular season.
But unique to any other sport, NASCAR’s Playoffs don’t only involve the drivers who’ve qualified. Instead, every other team continues to race and compete for their final finishing position for the season, and those drivers can also win and play spoiler.
That includes Michael McDowell. The driver of the No. 34 for Front Row Motorsports is leaving the team next season and wants to pick up a farewell win for the organization he’s been with for seven years.
McDowell explained that, with the first and second rounds of the Playoffs featuring both superspeedways and road courses, the only types of tracks he’s won on in the Cup Series before, missing out on qualifying this season was especially disappointing. But either way, he said Atlanta was its own challenge, a challenge that Playoff and non-Playoff drivers will have to rise to if they intend to win.
“It’s wide-open, but it’s very edgy and you’re right at the limit. It’s not Talladega and it’s not Daytona,” McDowell explained. “But at the same time runs still happen a little like a superspeedway where you get a big run and a big push, but then you’ve got to lift into the corner and you’re real light and sideways. It’s just busier, more intense and busier, with similar momentum but different overall feeling.”
Counting down from three for Xfinity
There’s just three races to go in the Xfinity Series regular season, and a superspeedway is an opportunity. When the field takes the green flag for Saturday’s Focused Health 250, airing at 3 p.m. ET on USA, PRN, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, nearly every driver has some chance at getting to victory lane.
Georgian Austin Hill is the defending winner at his home track and a three-time winner at the facility in the past, but he has two wins already this season.
With eight winners already this season, that means that four berths remain open for the twelve-driver postseason. Any new winner will automatically earn one of those berths (assuming the eligibility is not revoked by NASCAR, as happened to Austin Hill’s teammate in the Cup Series), but at least one is reserved for points.
Sheldon Creed, AJ Allmendinger, Parker Kligerman, and Sammy Smith occupy those spots coming into Atlanta. Creed and Allmendinger have comfortable points buffers of 109 and 105 points respectively, though not quite enough to clinch a berth yet. Kligerman enters with a 44-point advantage. Much narrower is Smith’s margin: the JR Motorsports driver enters just ten points above the provision cutline.
Below Smith is Ryan Sieg, who drives for RSS Racing, a family-owned team that came so close to victory at Texas Motor Speedway earlier this season, with Ryan missing out on the company’s first win by 0.002 seconds.
Atlanta is a tricky track for any driver to figure out if they do want to get that win or improve their points position. Cole Custer, who’s going for points to secure the regular season championship and the Playoff point bonus that he enters just 28 points shy of behind points leader Justin Allgaier, explained how tricky the recently reconfigured superspeedway-style track can be.
“I think when you look at Daytona and Talladega versus Atlanta, you know, it’s hard, but they are really similar. Atlanta just has so much more handling come into play and you have to worry a little bit more about how well your car handles on the track. There’s still an unknown, but not as much of one,” Custer explained.
“At Daytona, it’s all out all the time. It’s just a different kind of battle. At the same time, the runs can come very fast at Atlanta because the track is more condensed. It really makes it a fast-paced race where everyone is on their toes. It’s different, but still similar to traditional superspeedways. It honestly makes it very exciting, but also so nerve-racking as a driver just like a Daytona or Talladega.”
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