Mark Martin is one of the loudest voices heard around the NASCAR world today. The iconic driver decided to make himself relevant following all the outrage against the existing Cup Series format and has become a mainstream media figure once again. He appeared on the Harvick Happy Hour podcast recently alongside Kevin Harvick and detailed what led to this transition out of retirement.
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Harvick asked what led to him being comfortable with expressing unfiltered thoughts and hard opinions in today’s world. Martin replied that reading comments on social media and analyzing them over time has helped him develop an understanding of the fans. He said, “Over a period of time, I’ve built what I believe is a consensus of understanding the fans.
“The fans were the most important thing for you and I in our era because they were the ones who paid the bills. And so I have a strong allegiance to our fans and they supported me really strongly when I was a mediocre career driver.”
Martin also added that he often visits the local short track races, and not so much NASCAR races. This has led to him gaining a raw point of view about the sport.
He reflected, “Everybody I hear talk to at the racetrack tell me the same thing over and over and over again. And I see it. So I just decided that I could be their voice. You know, their voice is not being heard and so I can be their voice.”
Although standing by the fans and expressing those opinions does not always make him feel like an intellectual, he still does it because he thinks it’s true.
Martin’s open criticism of the existing playoff structure
One of the biggest issues that Martin has lent his voice for in recent days is to change the Cup Series playoff format. Urged by the results of multiple online polls, he has been demanding the sanctioning body return to a full-season championship format. He spoke about the same to Harvick.
“The majority of fans want a 36-race championship and then below that, 30% of the fans want a 10-race chase. And so 20% of the fans either want the playoff system or an adjusted version of the playoff system. And until somebody proves me wrong or until I get an answer for the fans for why their voice doesn’t matter in this decision, I’m going to keep it up,” Martin said.
The fight is ongoing, with NASCAR heavily relying on NBC Sports to make a decision. The dependency on the network is something that Martin and others hate. It remains to be seen what comes out of all this when the 2026 season begins.
