Ross Chastain and SVG fan

Carson rocking the “Hurricane Hocevar” hat at the NASCAR Awards Red Carpet. 🌀

Samantha Busch accepts the 2026 NASCAR NMPA Most Popular Driver Award on behalf of her late husband Kyle Busch. Samantha says: First of all, I'd like to say congrats to Kyle and Katelyn on your championship, and thank you guys so much for everything that you've done for our family. There's been so much love for Kyle from this sport over the past several months, and I wish more than anything that he could be here to see it. He gave so much of his life to racing, and I know it would mean the world to him to see the impact he had on NASCAR and the people who loved it. Kyle never changed who he was to make people like him. He was passionate, outspoken and fiercely competitive. He was Rowdy through and through. Whether you cheered for him or knew him, he gave you something to make noise about, and he loved that. To Kyle, that passion was what made this sport so special. Seeing that same passion bring everyone together to honor him has been incredible. I especially want to thank Chase Elliott and all the drivers who encouraged their fans to vote for him. That respect from the drivers he raced against means so much. And to the fans, I wish you knew just how much he meant to him. He loved packed grandstands, meeting families and seeing kids light up when he signed an autograph. He knew you spent your hard-earned money and time watching him race and he never took that for granted. He loved racing, and he loved that you did too. What makes this award extra special to me is what it gives to Brexton and Lennix. They miss their dad in ways that I can't even begin to explain. And through this, they get to see another side of the dad that they love so much: How he made people feel, how much he meant to others, and just how special he really was. And as their mom, that means everything to me. Thank you for this incredible honor and for continuing to show Kyle so much love. There was no Rowdy without the fans, and there will never be another Rowdy because there is truly no one else but Kyle. Thank you.

@Rossfan02 Fun fact. Bill Elliott pulled his name from the MPD award in 2001 so Dale Sr. Could win most popular driver.

So basically we turned this into a participation award. What a joke. Carson is the real mpd

For Kyle, and all of Rowdy Nation.

Denny better go tuck his car to bed, and tell it the story of no championship in his future

NASCAR 2026 Laps Led Leaders

The next gen is an absolute 100% failure. It made the racing worse across the board (every era of gen 6 before 2019 was better on intermediates too), it doesn’t save the teams money, and is fundamentally unfixable. And yet we still aren’t even considering its replacement.

Steve O'Donnell indicates a Gen 8 car is not on the horizon. He defended the Next Gen and said tweaks are likely but not a new car. Because of the Next Gen, O'Donnell said, "You have many new owners that have come into the sport. You have an ownership landscape that is much healthier than it was before. You have Dodge entering the sport. You have other OEMs who are looking at it, and you have pretty good racing. "The facts, when you look at those compared to other sports, are pretty strong. So I think it's important to look at what changes can you tweak along the way. "But for us, we want a sustainable model for the industry, a Gen 8 or next gen car comes with all kinds of costs and all kinds of different things. "So I'm confident in our guys and the industry and the OEMs to tweak what we have where necessary, but also be pretty confident in our drivers going out there and having the ability to go win races and put on some pretty darn good competition."

.@NBC got a 1.15 rating and 1.987 million viewers for Sunday's NASCAR Cup Series Xfinity 500 @MartinsvilleSwy, down from a 1.26 and 2.3 million last year, according to Nielsen's Big Data + Panel formula.