The season-opening Daytona 500 will take place on February 16, the Charlotte 600 on May 25, and an Atlanta race on the Saturday night of June 28.

Championship Weekend, when all three national series titles will be decided, will be held at Phoenix for a fifth year in a row, on October 31-November 2.

Thus, the Daytona 500 and Charlotte 600 dates are essentially unchanged relative to 2024, while the Playoffs reach a climax a week earlier than this year, which features a rare mid-season break due to the Olympic Games (telecast on NBC Sports in the United States, as is the back half of the NASCAR Cup Series season).

While next year’s Charlotte 600 will be the first telecast locally by Amazon Prime under a new, seven-year media rights contract, the significance of the Atlanta race is that it will be the start of an in-season knockout ‘tournament’.

Drivers will be seeded into a top 32 from results of the preceding three races, and compete head-to-head for a $1 million prize.

The 16 higher finishing drivers in each head-to-head at Atlanta will remain in contention for the next race, then eight for the next race after that, and so on until a winner of the bracket is decided.

All of those five races will be shown in the United States on TNT Sports, the other new media rights holder from 2025, while incumbents Fox and NBC will broadcast 14 races each.

“With the launch of our new media rights partnerships in 2025, we were excited to partner with Prime Video and TNT Sports to collaborate on fan engagement concepts that drive story lines in our sport and innovation from a production perspective,” said Brian Herbst, NASCAR SVP, media and productions.

“Having head-to-head driver match-ups for each one of TNT’s NASCAR Cup Series races will add a compelling fan engagement element across media platforms like TNT, Bleacher Report, House of Highlights and NASCAR digital platforms.”

The new concept follows the introduction of an in-season tournament in another North American sport competition, the NBA, during the past season.

Shane van Gisbergen will be hoping to be part of the top 32 bracket, given his aspiration to be competing full-time in the Cup Series in 2025.

The 2024 NASCAR season continues with the All-Star Race this weekend at North Wilkesboro Speedway, an event being sat out by van Gisbergen despite his eligibility as the 2023 Chicago Cup Series race winner.

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