After a tough trip to Loudon last week, the stars of the NASCAR Cup Series heads to America’s Heartland to take on one of the best circuits on the NASCAR calendar: Kansas Speedway.
A 1.5-mile intermediate, Kansas Speedway opened in 2001, and after a decade of racing at the facility, the sport decided to give the track progressive banking in the corners where the low line against the apron sits at 17° while along the outside wall ramps up to 20°.
This facility used to receive flak from fans and the media alike due to its “cookie-cutter” shape, but the NextGen car’s introduction gave way to a brand new era of Kansas Speedway where it quickly rose to prominence as one of the best tickets on the schedule.
With one driver already locked into the next round, the other 11 drivers square off to find out which one of them will avoid having to deal with the ever-treacherous Charlotte Roval that serves as the Round of 12 finale.
Champions Joey Logano, Kyle Larson, and Chase Elliott each nabbed wins here in the past. While points racing might be what’s on the minds of the drivers and teams, a win cures all ills and gives them five more playoff points to keep their title hopes alive next round.
When it’s all said and done, only one driver can come out on top. It could be someone like Denny Hamlin, the driver that holds the wins record at Kansas. Alternatively, it could be someone outside of the playoffs like Bubba Wallace’s 2022 victory.
No doubt we’ll see the best talents in the field rise to the occasion today, but the team that pushes all their chips in is likely to be the one that wins.
Last Week at Loudon…
Team Penske teammates Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney locked out the front row, and they stayed up front for much of the Mobil1 301.
Combined with Josh Berry, the trio led a dominant 273 of 301 laps as Logano led much of the first half of the event while Blaney took command for much of the late stages.
In the end, Blaney’s Libman Menards Mustang held off a furious but respectful charge from Berry to claim his third victory of the season while the headlines were dominated by an early clash between JGR teammates Denny Hamlin and Ty Gibbs.
This Week in NASCAR
News broke during the week out of the Richard Childress Racing team as longtime crew chief Randall Burnett was announced as the crew chief for Connor Zilisch at Trackhouse Racing starting in 2026.
Burnett aided RCR and then-driver Tyler Reddick in the creation of the NextGen car and rode that advantage to the tune of six victories in the span of a calendar year between 2022 and 2023, but since Gateway in June of 2023, the 8 team has gone winless. Hopefully, the two entities parting ways leads to better results for both sides.
Fox Sports’ Bob Pockrass gave us the scoop earlier in the week about the new tire for this weekend:
2014 Cup Series championship-winning crew chief Rodney Childers found a new home this week after he inked a deal with JR Motorsports to lead their No. 1 Chevy Camaro in the Xfinity Series in 2026.
Longtime Kaulig Racing president Chris Rice received a big promotion this week from owner Matt Kaulig. Rice will be recognized as the CEO of the race team in the future. Here is the team’s statement:
Later in the week, NASCAR made the shock announcement that they were firing race director Jusan Hamilton:
In yesterday’s Xfinity Series race at Kansas, Justin Allgaier swept the stages, but a poor pit stop sunk him from the lead to seventh, allowing Brandon Jones to take command of the event.
Jones led much of the final stage, pulling away from Connor Zilisch late en route to his second win of the 2025 season and punching his ticket to the Round of 8.
In Cup qualifying, a familiar name ended up on pole position as Chase Briscoe’s Bass Pro Shops Toyota laid down the fastest lap. For a full lineup, click here.
The Race
Today’s Hollywood Casino 400 at Kansas Speedway will be broadcast on USA Network starting at 3pm Eastern time with commentators Leigh Diffey, Steve Letarte, and Jeff Burton on the call.
The 400 in the race title represents the amount of miles to be run today around the 1.5-mile race track that comes out to 267 laps which will be split into three stages ending on the following laps: 80-165-267.
As for the average fall Cup race here at Kansas, it looks something like this: 8 cautions for 37 caution laps, 18 lead changes, an average duration of 3 hours and 3 minutes, the lap of final caution falling around lap 228 (or 40 laps to go), and only three instances of overtime in the last decade, most recently at the 2023 event won by Tyler Reddick.
Writer’s Pick
Last week’s writer’s pick happened to be Ryan Blaney, and he led 116 of 301 laps en route to his third win of the season.
This week, I’m taking his best friend and 2022 race winner Bubba Wallace to silence the doubters and punch his ticket to the Round of 8 for the first time in his career.
Wallace’s first round performance gave his fans optimism for a deep playoff run, but the 23 team’s first real hiccup occurred at Loudon where they weren’t competitive all day.
Facing a daunting climb to the cutline, Bubba must come to the Heartland with speed, and I believe he will do just that in taking his second win of 2025.
(Top Photo Credit: Toyota Gazoo Racing)
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