NASCAR is set to take a page out of the NBA's playbook with a new wrinkle being added to the 2025 season.
NASCAR will introduce a five-race in-season tournament next year with a $1 million prize up for grabs.
The introduction of the new concept coincides with the first season of NASCAR's seven-year media rights deal. The three races to determine the seeding for the tournament will be aired on Prime Video, while the tournament races will be broadcast on the TNT Sports portion of the 2025 Cup Series.
"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 storylines in our sport and innovation from a production perspective," Brian Herbst, NASCAR senior vice president of media and productions, said in a press release. "Having head-to-head driver matchups 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 format will feature 32 drivers being placed in an NCAA tournament-style bracket where the head-to-head matchups determine who advances to the next round. Seedings for the tournament will be decided by the highest result of each driver from the three preceding races. The five races that will make up the in-season tournament have not yet been announced.
"The idea of an in-season tournament has been discussed within the NASCAR industry and as we started to focus on adding promotional elements that drive interest throughout the season, we were excited by the opportunity to leverage the marketing weight of Amazon and TNT Sports to bring this concept to life," Herbst said.
Read 15 Comments
Download the app for comments Get the B/R app to join the conversation