Modern-day NASCAR is a racing league that is unique in the extended world of global motorsports owing to the format followed to reach the ultimate prize in the sport.
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Drivers and teams are seen battling for a regular season championship before they qualify for the postseason ‘Playoffs’. The same is a unique approach shared by stock car racing and several stick and ball sports leagues to crown the ultimate winner at the end of a season.
This allows qualified drivers to compete amongst themselves over a series of rounds in an elimination format while also sharing the track with non-playoff drivers who contend for race wins and general success separate from the title fight.
Cup Series driver and team owner Brad Keselowski recently reacted to a stat on social media highlighting how the format has changed the sport. Reacting to his name in the top 3 best average finishers in 2024 in the sports’ three nationwide series, the RFK Racing driver wrote, “Fun stat Wish it meant more.”
Fun stat
Wish it meant more. https://t.co/wH8Fq15Q2k
— Brad Keselowski (@keselowski) September 10, 2024
While the format is known to manufacture excitement and wild finishes to some extent, drivers are often seen winning a single race at the end of the year to be crowned champion.
Scraping through the elimination rounds with the ‘win and you’re in’ mentality is ever present in the driver’s and team’s minds as a single event could mean a non-performing team could be challenging during the postseason over a consistent front-runner. Harrison Burton’s win during the regular season finale at Daytona is a prime example of the same.
“There are a ton of fans than wish it meant more too”
NASCAR fans also reacted to Keselowski‘s take on a statistic telling of NASCAR’s focus on the new-age Playoffs structure and seemingly agreed with the veteran Cup Series driver. The RFK Racing co-owner was greeted with several positive responses.
“There are a ton of fans than wish it meant more too Brad. I wish @NASCAR would go back to crowning a season champion and not a race champion,” opined one fan, urging for the playoffs format to be scrapped in favor of a traditional championship challenge.
“If they’re not going to go back to a full season points format at least just take the top 16 in points or so whatever, and whoever rakes in the most points in the following 10 races wins,” rued another fan with a suggestive tweak to the current format while another fan reminisced on the sport’s past, “It used to, Brad…it used to.”
“Now you just gotta luck into wins apparently,” exclaimed another touching on the ‘win and you’re in’ format.
While it might be a stretch for the governance to switch up the fundamental idea of how a champion is crowned in the sport, NASCAR could possibly tweak the same format to increase the value of consistency towards the title fight, while also keeping the drama-inducing nature of the postseason intact.
