NASCAR 2026 Schedule Includes San Diego and Chicagoland, Moves All-Star Race to Dover

NASCAR in 2026 will race on a new street course in San Diego, return Chicagoland Speedway to the schedule, move the All-Star race to Delaware and end its 38-race season at Homestead-Miami Speedway in Miami.

The schedule released Wednesday includes two off weekends on a calendar that stretches from February to November. It begins with the Clash on February 1 at Bowman-Gray Stadium in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, for the second consecutive year, with the season-opening Daytona 500 to follow on February 15.

“This is a landmark schedule that demonstrates NASCAR’s continued innovation with a strong mix of beloved venues and exciting new and returning racetracks for race fans from coast to coast,” said Ben Kennedy, NASCAR xecutive vice president, chief venue & racing innovation officer. “The 2026 NASCAR national series schedules celebrate our nation’s 250th anniversary with NASCAR San Diego, welcome back Cup Series points races to Chicagoland Speedway and North Wilkesboro, takes the NASCAR All-Star Race to the Northeast for the first time and brings the NASCAR Championship back home to Homestead-Miami Speedway.”

The season ends November 8 in Florida at Homestead, which hosted the championship-deciding finale for 18 consecutive years before NASCAR shifted it to Phoenix Raceway in 2020. The race at Phoenix was given a different date in the playoffs and NASCAR is expected to rotate the season finale to various venues in ensuing years.

Chicagoland is reopening after a six-year hiatus and a switch back to the track located in suburban Joliet after three seasons on a temporary street circuit in downtown Chicago. The San Diego event will be held on a military base in Coronado. NASCAR dropped the Chicago street race and will not return to Mexico City, where a return in 2026 became difficult to schedule because of the FIFA World Cup.

NASCAR also moved Watkins Glen in New York from its traditional August date to Mother’s Day weekend and the all-star race from North Wilkesboro, North Carolina, to Dover so that North Wilkesboro will be a points-paying Cup race for the first time in 30 years. New Hampshire lost its playoff race to become the penultimate race of the regular season.

The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series will race for the first time as part of the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg weekend next year on February 28. Both the Truck Series and the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series will also participate as part of a tripleheader of national-series events in their debut in San Diego’s Naval Base Coronado alongside the NASCAR Cup Series, June 19-21.

The Craftsman Truck Series will share the bill in its St. Petersburg visit with the NTT IndyCar Series, which has opened its season on the 1.8-mile street course the last four years.

“Obviously, with the street races that we have now at the Cup Series, racing in San Diego, racing at the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, we want to make sure that our development series are racing at track types that allow them to advance and be prepared for the Cup level,” said Jusan Hamilton, NASCAR managing director, competition operations. “So, making sure we have a street race at the Truck Series level was something that we evaluated. Obviously, they have the first two street races they’ll have in their 30-year history, kicking off with the St. Pete Grand Prix, so it allows us to evaluate that market. Tampa/St. Pete is another huge media market.”

2026 NASCAR Cup Series Schedule

February 1: Clash at Bowman Gray Stadium
February 15: Daytona 500
February 22: Atlanta
March 1: Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas
March 8: Phoenix
March 15: Las Vegas
March 22: Darlington, South Carolina
March 29: Martinsville, Virginia
April 12: Bristol, Tennessee
April 19: Kansas
April 26: Talladega, Alabama
May 3: Texas
May 10: Watkins Glen, New York
May 17: All-Star Race (Dover)
May 24: Coca-Cola 600 (Concord, N.C.)
May 31: Nashville, Tennessee
June 7: Michigan
June 14: Pocono in Long Pond, Pennsylvania
June 21: San Diego
June 28: Sonoma, California
July 5: Chicagoland
July 12: Atlanta
July 19: North Wilkesboro
July 26: Brickyard 400 (Indianapolis)
Aug. 9: Iowa
Aug. 15: Richmond, Virginia
Aug. 23: New Hampshire
Aug. 29: Daytona, Florida
Sept. 6: Darlington
Sept. 13: Gateway in Madison, Illinois
Sept. 19: Bristol
Sept. 27: Kansas
Oct. 4: Las Vegas
Oct. 11: Charlotte Roval
Oct. 18: Phoenix
Oct. 25: Talladega
Nov. 1: Martinsville
Nov. 8: Homestead, Florida